Review Summary: Just a little shinier than before.
The Swedish sisterly folk duo First Aid Kit have been subtly charming their way into people’s hearts and their latest album is just another great example of their sweetness and song-writing abilities. At this point the band is far from their purely folk roots and it honestly surprises me that it took them this long to finally turn purely pop with acoustic elements, while to a lot of their contemporaries (namely Of Monsters and Men) even a mild debut success was a sign that that switch can take place. So yes, this is already a booming, lavishly produced, popstress record, where any folk is just a matter of element.
However –and this is important– in no way do I mean that this album turned into accessible pop. I mean that it has a much more of that simplistic flare, rather than folksy homeliness First Aid Kit excelled at in the past. The album is still incredibly enjoyable and sweet and the slightly deeper production on the acoustics does bring a lot of personality to it. But what stayed the same (and thankfully so) are the ever so beautiful vocals that were the first and foremost distinguishable trait of First Aid Kit’s gorgeous music. Here they are just as vivacious as one could possibly wish, with that familiar old rusty ring to them.
So with vocals and the sound both staying relatively great, what else is left to discuss? The song writing. The sisters are excellent songwriters. The tunes and melodies combined with the aforementioned professionalism of sound, caressing instrumentation and magnetic vocal delivery, creates an experience to behold. It’s quite simple to explain actually; the tunes alone are so sweet and strike with instant warmth that they might have singlehandedly saved this album, even if it had been failing on every other aspect. So even the fourth time in the studio the band doesn’t lose its steam and keeps on delivering a tonne of greatness. There’s really nothing else to it, it’s just really good.
