Review Summary: hyper-pop duo Frost Children make excellent indie rock record with ease, hundreds of other artists embarrassed, more on this at 9
In one of the most exciting musical expeditions of 2023, hyper-pop duo Frost Children dropped a legit indie rock album just seven months after their previous LP. It’s the kind of cross-genre pollination that’s sure to raise eyebrows, as the very terms “hyper-pop” and “indie-rock” tend to be mutually exclusive, and god forbid
Hearth Room should boil down to a game of what parts of their core sound are supplanted with tired indie tropes and which aren’t. But siblings Lulu and Angel Prost are clearly very smart, so it isn’t as simple as that.
It’s also unsurprising that the weakest moments here are played entirely straight. “Got Me By the Tail” serves as little more than a cheeky lyrical nod to the album cover (featuring the duo reimagined as (very cute) canines in wigs), as its skeletal electric guitar-and-vocal arrangement is completely stripped of their usual trappings other than a couple catchy melodies. Even worse, the first track, “Lethal,” is just about everything you’d be worried this album would be. It’s a cookie-cutter indie rock ballad with vapid choruses and vocals that sound plain uncomfortable in these trappings—not a good sell. If this unfortunate opener wasn’t also the lead single, it’d be easy to pass off as a wry example of “how not to do it.” But those brave enough to give them the benefit of the doubt will be quickly rewarded—soon comes “Stare at the Sun,” a bona fide banger that skips along a jagged math-rockian rhythm section before exploding into a thrillingly cathartic breakdown complete with furious drumbeats and Lulu’s shouted vocals belting over and over “I GIVE AND I TAKE!!!”
However, it’s in the quieter moments that Frost Children truly stand out from their contemporaries. Centerpiece/highlight “Bernadette” immediately owns its folk influences with twinkly guitar plucking and canned viola samples. If it sounds a bit disparate and cutesy at first, as the song blooms suddenly every quirk and whim resonates with impact. Where your average folk-rock act might simply throw in some handclaps to deliver a song’s climax, Frost Children douse the entire thing in fuzz, heightening the vulnerability of the lovelorn lyrics and winsome soundscapes through aching distortion. Even sweeter still, “Birdsong” and “Forest Park” are beautiful, whistling tunes that feel handcrafted for your morning nature walk. As plunking guitars and gentle percussion tap over lyrics about “The mallards and the doves / The drakes and the ducks,” one has plenty of time to admire the intricate production of two artists joyously playing with brand-new toys.
And that’s how, on the vast majority of the record, each tendency toward genre cliche is matched by the duo’s natural instinct to subvert them. That’s the greatest advantage of artists breaking out of their comfort zone into foreign genres—their dispositions are often alien, and rarely take you where you expect to go. For those tired of how sedentary “indie” has been in this not-so-new decade, try hearing it through these outsiders’ ears. You may just learn to fall in love again.
