Rogue Wave’s past decade has been defined by two reputations that seem unrelated on the surface. The first is that they excel at a kind of jangly, chiming, and softly anthemic iteration of indie rock that made a lot of television music supervisors’ jobs easier in the mid-2000s. The other is that the Oakland band has incredibly shitty luck. Rogue Wave does everything earnestly, and in the last couple of years, they’ve tried in earnest to shed these reputations. And they’ve not found much success. On "Chicago x 12," a single from 2007's Asleep at Heaven's Gate, Zach Rogue expressed the dissonance between his band's critical acclaim and their demoralizing tours with one heartbreaking line: "it don't matter/cause no one comes out to see us." More pointedly, 2010’s Permalight was a slick dance-pop rebranding, an admirable strategy that unfortunately played to none of the band's strengths and created no new ones. Newly signed to Vagrant Records, Nightingale Floors arrives with Rogue Wave bearing acceptance of who they are: they’ve made a good record of jangly, chiming, and softly anthemic indie rock. And in 2013, that makes it a record with exceptionally poor timing.
Opener “No Magnatone” serves as a mission statement for Nightingale Floors even if doesn’t actually say very much. It’s a wisp of a song, little more than a ringing guitar figure and Zach Rogue’s soft, strangely enunciated vocals moving together in shuffle time. It lets you know Rogue Wave have readjusted their mechanics and, immediately after, “College” proves to be the first time they’ve truly connected in years. It bears all the characteristics of Rogue Wave’s slightly cracked and wholly tuneful past highlights: snappy, major key melodies disguising depressive lyrics, enthusiastic strummed acoustic guitars backing singing electric leads, verse-chorus structures nudged by off-kilter time signatures. Nightingale Floors positions itself as the logical next step for Rogue Wave had the ill-fated Permalight been replaced by Come Back to Us*,* the solo album Rogue put out in 2011 as Release the Sunbird. The gorgeous, kinda mushy “The Closer I Get” hearkens back to Come Back’s emotionally and instrumentally naked folk pop and serves as a retroactive advertisement for an album that mostly went overlooked.
John Congleton’s typically holistic and crisp production forces Rogue Wave to ensure the underlying song structures of “Siren’s Song” and “Used to It” can support their ambitions of multi-tiered builds and swelling crescendos. They succeed in those instances, but elsewhere, you’re reminded that Asleep at Heaven's Gate's weaknesses weren’t just a result of puffy production or unmet arena-rock aspirations. As Rogue continually dials down the tempos or broadens song length, he hasn't compensated for them with melody; even the quieter, acoustic moments on Rogue Wave’s first two records were briskly performed, so even if they didn’t pop, they at least fizzed. Eight-minute closer “Everyone Wants to Be You” aside, Nightingale Floors is compact and centered enough to avoid drift; it just goes through enough unmemorable, mid-tempo patches to remind you why so many listeners and artists sought out more rhythmically exciting sounds at a time when post-Shins indie rock loomed large.
It’d be unfair to judge Nightingale Floors within the context of prevailing trends that are out of Rogue Wave’s control if they it didn’t appear to be such a pervasive concern for Zach Rogue himself. How could they not be? “The gravity of career ambition/ Never meant that much to me,” Rogue shrugs on “Figured it Out”, though it would appear there’s an implication of denial. The occasional hints at familial disappointments on “Used to It”, unfulfilled ambitions on “College”, and resigned acceptance elsewhere suggest Rogue hasn’t lost his self-awareness, that being themselves probably won’t make Rogue Wave any bigger than they were when they wrote “Chicago x12”. But maybe the rooms will be smaller and the crowds more appreciative. Nightingale Floors isn’t a confessional, nor is it a cry for help, but an attempt to be the acceptance Rogue wants to see in the world-- a modest record of modest aims from a songwriter coming to terms with his current station.
