youbet - Way To Be

“Knowing when to stop / That must be sweet,” sighs the bittersweet opening gambit of ‘Carsick’ – a lament to the dangerous appeal of living too hard. Yet whilst the second LP from Brooklyn’s Nick Llobet is lyrically rooted in excess, ‘Way To Be’’s emotionally-intelligent indie is a lesson in how to hit the goosebump-inducing sweet spot. Intimate yet rich, ‘Nurture’’s woozy, stripped-back softness nods to Elliott Smith, while ‘Deserve’ fleshes the palette out to a delicate seesaw of haunting keys cut through by buzzing guitar lines. ‘Vacancy’ then makes for a late-album highlight – its perfectly-deployed harmonies and chord progressions designed to tingle the spine. Throughout, their unusual, fragile vocals lend a charm that can’t be taught; we’d be very happy, however, if they brought out a guide on how to pen tracks whose nuances can hit you in the feels quite this hard.