EXPLORE the full album index here
#27
First Aid Kit | Ruins
Columbia
According to Liz Itkowsky: “Compared to their previous work, Ruins feels subtle, a little more grown up. While it is missing some of the energy of earlier singles like “Stay Gold” and “Silver Lining,” this album expands upon their mastery of the American songbook. Never feeling like outsiders, the Söderbergs are consistent and confident in their execution. Working with producer Tucker Martine and Peter Buck or R.E.M. fame, Ruins has the requisite twang that has charmed listeners since their debut EP Drunken Trees (2008). The perfect combination of the sisters’ voices remains the heart of their music. Their harmonizing is organically crystal clear in a time of over-synthesized production; the purity is shocking.
Ruins may not recapture the intensity of Stay Gold, but its strength lays in the duo’s swooning vocals and lyrical romance. Where it misses the loud, creative production of past albums, folk vocals with a little extra (those harmonies!) pick up the slack. Ruins is a charismatic, concise send-up of a style unclaimed by many young American musicians in 2018, but exquisitely executed by these special Swedish talents.”
LISTEN:
WATCH:
