Australian indie pop collective Architecture in Helsinki have spent the last decade refining their lineup and their sound: while slimming down from eight members to five, the group has moved from cluttered, colourful, hyper-active twee to a sleeker, more focused brand of pop. 2011 full-length Moment Bends was their largest step yet in that direction, a record that paid homage to the sound of the 80s with bubbly synth tones, drum machine backbones, and extensive use of vocal processing. The band’s new record, the cheekily titled NOW + 4EVA, finds them continuing to embrace simple, radio-friendly sounds, with one foot newly planted in the realm of contemporary synth-pop songwriting.
It’s to the band’s credit that their gradual shift towards a mainstream pop tradition feels devoid of cynicism or condescension, qualities that tend to loom over indie bands making a push for commercial glory. In fact, NOW + 4EVA rings with a genuine enthusiasm for pop music, something that should be recognized and appreciated. Unfortunately, the group’s reverence for the form doesn’t directly translate into successful or memorable songwriting; instead, their tepid compositions invite listeners to seek out contemporaries and sonic ancestors with superior material.
The problem’s neatly encapsulated by the band’s cover of Jackie DeShannon’s 1963 standard “When You Walk in the Room”, a song that’s been tackled by everyone from Merseybeat bit players to ABBA alumni. Architecture in Helsinki’s admiration for the song is seemingly sincere—in a recent interview with Australian music site Moshtix, vocalist Cameron Bird mentioned their love for the original recording and its presence as a staple of their live shows—but their version is missing the subliminal sexual charge that renders the original so indelible. DeShannon makes it clear with the intensity of her delivery that this is an adult fantasy, one that’s dominating her brain and making it hard for her to focus on anything else; in the hands of Kellie Sutherland, the song’s stripped of that latent energy, and her take isn’t helped by an arrangement that’s saccharine to the point of cavity creation.
That slip-up aside, NOW + 4EVA’s finest moments coincide with Sutherland’s turns at the forefront: she has an airy, light vocal tone that’s reminiscent of compatriot Kylie Minogue, and helps shimmering pop-disco tracks like the funky “I Might Survive” and “2 Time” to achieve an easy, frictionless glide. Bird is less successful, struggling to sell a handful of goopy ballads (“Born to Convince You”, “April”) scattered throughout the album’s back half; ultimately, the weight of the failure falls on the group’s songwriting, rather than his takes on the material.
Looking at this album in the context of Architecture in Helsinki’s discography sheds light on a hidden strength of the band’s earlier hyperactive approach to composition: by jamming several discrete ideas into standard-length songs and moving between them with abandon, the group made it harder to isolate weak passages, and ensured the strongest bits rose to the front of listeners’ minds. The band has sharpened their focus on their most recent records, but in doing so has placed a spotlight on their songwriting and performance. It’s a shame that NOW + 4EVA can’t withstand this greater level of scrutiny.
