The largely instrumental psychedelic pop-rock group Citay-- led by San Francisco guitarist Ezra Feinberg-- started their career on the cred-propping Important imprint with a self-titled debut half-full of somber sounds. Two albums later, Little Kingdom foregoes the melancholy, its eight tracks built with hearty strumming, wordless choruses, and ascendant synthesizers. Made by Feinberg with eight friends including Fucking Champ and fucking great producer Tim Green and Tussle drummer Warren Huegel, Little Kingdom is all grins and winks and exaltations, gloriously embossed with shimmering solos and high-times harmonies. Only "Former Child" starts somberly here, foreboding tones appearing through steady acoustic patterns. But six minutes later, it's Chariots of Fire-triumphant, cymbals snapping over the back of a three-guitar climb. Like the rest of Little Kingdom, it feels great, a quality that's sure to get Feinberg and his gone-to-California ease dismissed as a hippy making spacey background music.
That's sort of the point. Little Kingdom is about letting go, about finding meaning in the small yet resourceful. The four tracks with lyrics all end with resplendent "Ahh" choruses, signs of resignation to difficult questions: On the title track, Feinberg sings about waking and writing a to-do list. He needs to listen to "Crazy on You" and find love, but he only asks the day to make a little crown for his Little Kingdom. Opener "First Fantasy" finds contentment in being lost in space and time, and "On the Wings" mirrors that sentiment with "Maps of my days show all the messy ways/ My mind is a stranger with directions." When Feinberg sings these songs, his voice is always more than his own, backed by harmonies or bolstered by effects that make him seem a little bigger than a guy commanding any guitar he touches. Feinberg's Little Kingdom has room for others.
By extension, Little Kingdom is a multifunctional record, the sort of music that sits well at work through small speakers or on city streets through earbuds or at a party through a proper system. Its holistic sound is largely passive, dipping only to respectable lows and peaking above anything more than a breezy bustle just twice in nearly 45 minutes. Every track builds naturally: Like a meticulous oil painting, "A Riot of Color" rises one sheet at a time, starting with an acoustic guitar, then adding spry mandolin, sustained electric notes, and a second electric guitar that dances around the first like a moth flirting with fire. Bass and keyboard eventually settle in, just as the acoustic lead begins its slow descent. The sounds fall away without fading away, disappearing in time to reveal the next track, which reveals the Citay dogma: "Friends are like lovers but they're cooler."
Little Kingdom follows this model of easy-going inclusion: Feinberg has his influences, but over two albums, he's continued to distill them into something his own, something that's lush and layered without being overly dense or didactic. The result sounds a little like a lot of things, and there's something here for most everyone. The comfortable acoustic hum of "First Fantasy" sounds vaguely like the first song on the first Aqueduct record, and the mandolin-guiding "On the Wings" recalls "Find the Cost of Freedom". And if that's not Jerry Garcia stepping everywhere in tricky little intervals on "A Riot of Color", Feinberg must have spent the last year moonlighting with Dark Star Orchestra. Those are limited interpretations, of course, and you'll have your own. They'll all be valid, too, even if your instinct reads something like, "Sounds like some goddamn hippy." Once again, that's the point.
