Needs More Cowbell
The musical duo Azalia Snail (her birth-given name) and Dan West have been making music separately for several years. Snail, originally an East Coast girl, relocated to Los Angeles and eventually met West, SoCal born and raised, to create their musical project LoveyDove in 2012. Signed to a small record label called LA’s Fine Records, they’ve released their self-titled debut folk-pop album to, well, basically no reviews at all.
“Soft Sun” opens the album with some beautiful chimes and picks up the pace just a little, but remains contained and generally slow. The slow, simple keyboard and guitar melodies remain in follow-up track “Deep Down Inc.” The keys and guitar hit such low notes it’s almost eerie, which is cool, but it also comes off as a little too cheesy. Speaking of cheesy, “Gently As You Feel” sounds like it could have been used as a montage song in a Brady Bunch movie.
On the contrary, the guitar in “Sweet Ride” is great, incorporating an alt-rock sound that is missed throughout the rest of LoveyDove. Vocally, Snail takes charge for the most part, although West gets his time to shine too in “Gently As You Feel” as he takes over the lead vocals. “Less Is Never More” is a nice duet, but contains no actual lyrics.
LoveyDove is more folk than psychedelic and more easy-listening than pop. It’s pretty, but also modest. Does the world need another guy/girl folky Los Angeles band whose influences include The Beatles and the sun, moon and stars? Probably not, especially something so quiet and undemanding of attention. Coming from two music veterans, it would be nice to hear some more uniqueness to their sound.
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