Heavenly Beat - Talent

Heavenly Beat’s debut long-player is a punchy, more direct take on the sound championed by the likes of Wild Nothing; he’s obviously a lucid dreamer, as he is much more behind the reigns of the dreaminess shrouding his debut album, ‘Talent’.

What has drawn people to Heavenly Beat in the first place is mainly the fact that it’s a Beach Fossils side project, from bassist John Pena. Beach Fossils had their own particular sound, but they often sounded like a band with blinkers on; they never ventured away from the tight rhythms of their guitar work, apart from on their second album which disappointingly just played second fiddle to Wild Nothing’s jangle and synth formula.

‘Talent’ has everything that people now come to expect from a Captured Tracks release. It’s admirable that a label has been able to carve its own niche through keeping within a certain pool of artists. The sampling and looping that makes up the details of this debut make it stand up as a much more modern work than that of Pena’s day job. The signature whispered vocals are ever present; it would sound strange for something Beach Fossils-related to be without them.

The most interesting element of his chosen samples is the way that more classical instruments and acoustic guitar strums are looped, while his vocals occasionally get the remix treatment and judder along. Stand out tracks ‘Messiah’ and ‘Faithless’ prove to be the best embodiments of the sound explored on ‘Talent’. Here’s hoping that Beach Fossils and each of their musical members never grow tired of branching out on their own.