Ducktails - Landscapes (2009) [Olde English Spelling Bee] // Grade: B-

For Ducktails’ mastermind Matt Mondanile, beach pop isn’t about Miami Vice, fun-fun-fun or however many California girls (and it’s certainly not about any mid-century ponying with Frankie and Annette). Rather, Mondanile’s tropical influence seems to come from the shore at dusk—just after the beach balls and coolers have been put away, just before the post-sunset dinner and drinks. That lazy vacation moment when everything goes all orange and you sit silent and introspective on the sand.

And it’s a mostly pleasant place to see through Mondanile’s eyes, even if the image falters at times. Landscapes is a warm, ambient jaunt through lo-fi Florida, all washed out technicolor and layers of harmony; definitely of the same stripe as fellow bedroom producers Wavves and even Mondanile’s own Real Estate, but with an aesthetic keenly focused on beach buskers and Muzak versions of, like, “These Dreams”. Opener “On The Boardwalk” really does feel like a boardwalk stroll (if that boardwalk happens to run through 80s Miami), and the few vocal-focused tracks like “Wishes” and “House of Mirrors” (“focused” being a relative term here) live in some world where guys really do sit on the docks of bays and mumble sweet songs about, you know, whatever.

‘Course, this sort of lo-fi instrumental can shift quickly from intentional aesthetic to jam-band amateur if even the slightest element is off, and Landscapes definitely has its blah moments. Take “Landrunner”: ostensibly an amped-up ode to the more frantic inland ways (i.e. a sort of hilarious counterpoint to the rest of the album) all but ruined by too-squealy guitars and seemingly preset drum loops. Few tracks are truly awful, but the album would be miles better without any distraction from the sunset, the sand and that one guy strumming a weird little song at the other end of the beach.

- Rue Sauvage