“Oh, listener,” Au Revoir Simone said, “we could have had such a damn pretty time together.” Ok, not really. But essentially: the fashionable ladies of the Brooklyn synth-pop trio were playing ‘Lucky One,’ the first track on their sophomore album, and after a minute or so of ebbing chords and twinkling wind chimes, a voice wafted in: “I dream of togetherness.” Things continued in that vein, their airy compositions augmented with bells, handclaps, all-together-now choruses, the mood sometimes mellow, and sometimes playful, incorporating a giddy new wave bounce or, in ‘A Violent Yet Flammable World,’ the eternal drums from ‘Be My Baby.’ The lyrics were wistful and romantic throughout (“You make me wanna measure stars in the backyard with a calculator and a ruler baby/I found a letter that describes how the moonlight will lead me to the distant place that you will be,” from, ‘Stars’), and the affect, finally, was not so much transportative as persuasive. I pressed the headphones against my ears. “Yes,” I said, it is awfully pretty to think so.”
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