Electronic Sound May 2015 (Regular Edition) | Page 37

TWIN SHADOW
Eclipse

WARNER BROTHERS
If it’s powerful 80s style synthpop you’re
after, George Lewis Jr delivers
With two albums in the bag for 4AD
Records, a few months back George
Lewis Jr announced that he was putting
the skids on his planned tour and
the release of his next long player to
“reconsider where Twin Shadow was
headed”. That reconsideration resulted in
him swapping 4AD for Warner Brothers
and “hopefully a coffee with Prince”.
Indeed, one might imagine that a hot
beverage with Prince would be right up
Lewis’ street, as the New Yorker’s new
album is heavily inspired by everything
80s.
Lewis’ journey is hardly the typical
rock star story of a lost childhood in
a grimy inner city. Before hotfooting
it to New York, he was brought up in
sunny suburban Florida, where his dad
worked as a hairdresser. Born in 1983,
and therefore just about old enough to
remember the big synthpop and soft rock
tunes that defined an era, he admits to
nomadic trips to Copenhagen and Berlin
in search of the source of Bowie’s divine
inspiration.
‘Eclipse’ roadmaps those allusions to the

past, but while George Lewis Jr wears
his heart on his sleeve and doesn’t
hide his influences, he rarely resorts to
pickpocketing ideas from the pin-ups
of his youth. So although this album
is nostalgic, it is unashamedly free of
pretension, and that’s no more evident
than on the opening ‘Flatliners’, its lonely
piano and curling synth refrains drawing
you in before Lewis’ rich, earthy vocal
delivers a sucker punch power ballad.
What follows is a record packed with
expressive three-and-a-half-minute pop
statements (almost any of which could
be plucked out as a single), a record that
harks back to a time when everything,
especially music, seemed rather more
simplistic.
This is pretty much the story of ‘Eclipse’
– bright, expansive keyboards and
stomping drums united by stuttering

guitar chords and meaningless lyrics,
which matter little when the album’s
melodies are so agreeably lavish. From
start to finish, it rarely diverges from this
template. The first bars of the closing
‘Locked And Loaded’ ooze with deep,
breathy synths and passionate vocals,
while tracks like ‘Back To The Top’ and
‘When The Lights Turn Down’ (the cheesy
titles say it all) foam with balladic drama.
Ultimately, what’s most likeable about
‘Eclipse’ is that it is a real grower and the
songwriting delivers potent, memorable
powerpop. Of course, those attributes are
still exhibited today in the designer huff
of Lady GaGa or Katy Perry, but George
Lewis Jr couldn’t be any less cool – and
therein lays his authenticity and this
album’s charm.
DANNY TURNER