Secret Meeting score: 66
by Phil Scarisbrick
Minnesota natives, Hippo Campus, this week returned with their sophomore album, Bambi. Coming just 18 months after their debut record, the band have garnered attention for their enthusiastic indie-pop which has seen them develop an ever-burgeoning audience.
Mistakes, a synth-drenched, Fleet Foxes-evoking opener, sets up an atmosphere of intrigue. The lack of percussion to anchor the track makes it shimmy through your psyche, getting you strapped in and excited for what you’re about to hear. The layered vocals and crying horns combine for what is a superb album opener. The grandeur melancholy of track one makes way for Anxious – a lightweight, synth-pop slog that doesn’t do its predecessor the justice it deserves. There is undoubtedly a market for this kind of thing – and its chorus will win many over – but it takes several steps back.
By the time we get to the title track, it’s easy to see that this kind of synth-pop is exactly what this record is all about. Mistakes was less of a set up for the rest of the album, but more of a standalone piece that wouldn’t have fit anywhere else. The lyrical vulneribility that runs throughout the record is never more prevalent than on Bambi, as frontman, Jake Luppen, sings “I swear to go God, I wasn’t born to fight/Maybe just a little bit, enough to make me sick of it.” Inspired by the recent rise of the #MeToo movement, the band have clearly used the subtext of that cause and surrounding issues – such as toxic masculinity – as the emotional thread.
Just when you think you’ve got the record’s musical ethos figured out, Think It Over commences with another sparse sounding introduction before settling into a mid-paced croon that works well as a mid album segue. Golden‘s pleasing melodies are some of the best on show here and shows a maturity in arrangement that we’ve yet to hear so far.
We’re presented with a few conundrums. While their are several moments that tick every box, there are also some that fall flat. The earnestness of the lyrics are very endearing and some of the melodies that deliver them are also great, but consistency is lacking. From the grand openings, this is just a decent – and sometimes very decent – synth-pop record. No doubt this album will please many people though. The lack of bravado, mixed with the sounds of young men clearly loving what they’re doing is a great recipe. While it has its flaws, it does enough to tempt intrigue for the next step.
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