Album Review: The Soft Walls Fail To Break Through Lo-Fi Indie Mold With Self-Titled Debut Album

By: Alex Lee –

Psychedelic rock, as we’ve come to know it, has become paved with a set of stock details. It’s a lo-fi affair doused in blankets of reverb and its an ambient torrent of submerged vocals and gently picked guitar lines that reacquaints listeners with 60’s sensibilities. Sonically, a process of subtraction, utilizing an airy sense of space and filling the void with hypnotic melodies, guides its production.

The self-titled debut by The Soft Walls, a side project by Cold Pumas’ guitarist Dan Reeves, strays not too far from these qualities. It’s a muffled ride of predictable ambience that sounds dully formulated through observing the works of the tastemakers of psychedelic rock. The end product is an album that sounds hindered by its timid efforts to reach the lofty highs of some of today’s acclaimed acts in the genre.

The album’s skeletal structure squeezes dry the essential details of psychedelic rock, taking the most distinctive aspects of the genre and blowing it up to a scant of 30 minutes. It’s often directionless, guided only by a motif of sheer recreation of the spaced-out, atmospheric sensibilities so ubiquitous in the genre. Rather than formulating a newfound aesthetic that would bring Reeves’ ambitions on par to his musical edifice, the record is unapologetic to its disposition to remain ambiguous throughout.

While efforts like “Best If I Go” showcase the album’s slow but definite creative growth, major portions of the album’s dissonant sound make its lack of a structural blueprint too obvious. Songs like “Self Helper” and “Can’t Decide” struggle in mapping out a clear direction, often falling flat by sounding like pure imitations of songs we’ve heard all too many times. “Joan” is one of the more rare moments where the empowering over-production is traded in for a much more interesting effort. Reeves’ vocals sound hazy and tired, but his austere tone manages to fuel the hypnotic essences of the record.

Its last two songs break the album’s rickety progression. “House Concern” sounds almost out of place in comparison to previous tracks, yet the evocative barrage of house beats, ethereal atmosphere and brilliant pacing makes it irresistible. “Casual Throne” lets go of the claustrophobic context of the album’s efforts at psychedelic rock. It doesn’t break any new ground, but its subtle beat mixed with careful guitar lines and soft rhythms make for a cerebral closer to the album.

The Soft Walls sound both impeccably polished and stylistically charged. However, it’s the album’s obsessive—and clearly lethal—disposition in trying too hard to fit the mold of your standard lo-fi indie that breaks its focus. The results is a record with endless potential that lost its shine by a lack of natural cultivation. The aesthetics are clearly well-defined, but Reeves’ sound is lost on these songs, almost as if he is clueless as to what makes an album tick.

Essential Tracks: “Joan,” “House Concern,” and  “Casual Throne.”