BOTW Review: Pure Bathing Culture – Moon Tides

Feeling in the mood for some slow jamz? Not the Kanye kind – the chilled out, ethereal Portland, Oregon kind. The everything-is-shimmering-and-beautiful kind. You are?! Great. Get your hands on this.

Pure Bathing Culture (aka Sarah Versprille and Daniel Hindman) have, on this their debut album, delineated their own specific brand of mystical, synth-laden wonder. But before we go any further, the obvious must be said: male-female duo pedalling ethereal synth-pop? Where have we seen that before… Unfortunately, the Beach House comparison sometimes feels a little too close for comfort, for instance on ‘Seven 2 One’, which also happens to include the impenetrably kooky and downright mathematically incorrect line: ‘all subtraction is seven minus one’ (not true, folks. There are many numbers and they can all be subtracted from each other.)

Minor criticisms aside, Pure Bathing Culture may even have some advantages over Baltimore’s very own deities of mellow synth-pop:

One – if you need some music to put on at the end of the night to kind of casually wind down/make your move, there is a good chance that your date won’t have been seduced to the sound of Pure Bathing Culture before. For these purposes, I would recommend the sultry number ‘Scotty’.

Two – maybe I am underplaying this slightly, but did I mention that Pure Bathing Culture are really, really good? They have a certain eighties-tinged optimism that is all their own. The Fleetwood Mac comparisons are entirely justified, if that is how you want to express their knack for achieving melodic perfection, but their sound is as luscious and expansive as the Amazon in the wet season. With its ringing guitar chords and Versprille’s cooing vocals, Moon Tides will leave you feeling more at peace with yourself than any yoga session you have ever done. Guaranteed.

‘Pendulum’ and ‘Evergreener’ are prime examples of the group’s signature shimmering synths with some bossa nova-esque percussion, just to add a dash of 60s-style lounge jazz allure. ‘Golden Girl’, with its exposed vocals, resounding reverb punctuated by chords that swell, linger and slowly die away along with the driving, darkly mystical ‘Temples of the Moon‘ demonstrate just how evocative Hindman and Versprille’s song writing can be. You don’t want to miss this one.

– Katherine Travers