The Love Language
Ruby Red
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Rock
After several changes in location and a plethora of contributing musicians, The Love Language is back with the same pop but a different approach in its third album Ruby Red.
The Triangle band’s renowned garage-pop strings together the 10 songs from start to finish. However, with the familiar sound comes new and rejuvenating styles that are not too ambitious but carefully separate Ruby Red from the legacy of the group’s previous albums.
Led by the devoted Stuart McLamb, The Love Language opens its gate and invites breezy synths and chimerical orchestral from early 80s new wave to contribute to songs such as “Hi Life” and the hazy reminiscence of “Golden Age.”
But while the similar “On Our Heels” is carried by shimmering strings, it concludes with an explosive and erratic fuzz guitar blowout, showing McLamb is willing to combine the band’s fervent past with its luscious future. “On Our Heels” is a blend of the new and the native, however, the brief standout “Faithbreaker” clearly shows that the band’s signature grainy lo-fi pop is still intact.
However, a few tracks like “Kids” are so coarse it is hard to make out what McLamb is actually saying within the cloud of reverb. Nevertheless, by keeping close to the blissful grit, McLamb shows he is progressing the band and not tweaking it into something that does not fit the preexisting and successful mold.
While Ruby Red is a short album totaling around 30 minutes, it has a force that quickly gains momentum. The aggressive “First Shot” will leave listeners with a bruise while “Pilot Light” climactically soars into the skies with McLamb vigorously singing about “finally seeing the light.”
The Love Language found a voice out of heartbreak with the self-titled debut and surpassed any notion of a sophomore slump with the exceptional Libraries. Now Ruby Red proves The Love Language is reliable as a band that delivers, while showing McLamb has the sensibility of an expansive composer with the energy of a free-willed, backyard rocker.
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