La Sera - Music for Listening to Music to

The beauty of La Sera’s music has always been its saccharine contrast; cutting like a wincingly potent margarita, and sweetened with a sugary glass rim. With a name that vaguely nods in the direction of Andy Williams’ joyfully elated ‘Music to Watch Girls By,’ with a tongue-in-cheek twist, this album also sees Todd Wisenbaker officially stepping on board, becoming a fully-fledged member of ex-Vivian Girl Katy Goodman’s band.

Ryan Adams is apparently a busy man, flitting off to remake Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ in a country style (as you do) at a moment’s notice. As a result, he swung by for a week to produce ‘Music for Listening to Music to,’ and there’s a distinct grit missing throughout La Sera’s fourth outing. All too often, this record feels to be tentative, and holding back. Though Goodman continues to channel a wonderful kind of wryly smiling romance through many of her lyrics, this album just isn’t the music for listening to her lyrics to; pardon the title-nodding pun.

In The Smiths-meets-unhinged-rockabilly of ‘Time to Go’ and the noodling ‘Nineties’ - with a lead vocal appearance from Wisenbaker - nail that same playful opposition, for an overwhelming portion of this Ryan Adams-produced record, La Sera just sound a bit too polite, and lacking in the smirking mischief of previous releases.