School of Seven Bells Tell A Ghostory

Picking up where they left off with Disconnect From Desire, School of Seven Bells have once again made a stupendously perfect album with Ghostory.  This is like hearing an updated Cocteau Twins let loose in a post shoegazing electronics warehouse with the songs you've always imagined coming to fruition. Spacey, organic, and seemingly destined to go on forever, the School of Seven Bells create incessant swirling songs of seismic sonic shifts that are so graceful and filled with glee that you can't help but be mesmerized by them.

If dream pop died somewhere around 1993 and was buried by NME in 1994 someone clearly forgot to send School of Seven Bells the memo. Put it this way, Ghostory is so rooted in shoegazing that you would almost swear that this record is eighteen years old and quite honestly this isn't a bad thing as a record this blindingly good manages to overcome all obstacles including the space time continuum with relative ease. Layering electronics amongst a sea of instrumentation, and dare I say it, ghost-like vocals, Ghostory does anything but detach from the listener. Instead, this record wraps its arms around you and swings you around in a sunshiny swirl that's covered in Balearic beats, intelligent lyrics, and an artsy approach that will take over your mind.

Ghostory is a glistening album of guitars, synths, soaring vocals and songs that are steeped in mysticism and magic but are always aware of a need for a pop hook. You know exactly where School of Seven Bells is coming from if you can imagine the Cocteaus in a head on collision with someone like Single Gun Theory or even Curve. From the driving drums of, "Lafaye," to the dance pop stormer, "Low Times," (someone do a remix of this please) nothing about Ghostory would suggest mediocrity. This is a magnificent and majestic record that's like listening to a flood of memories crashing inside of your brain. Nearly perfect and packed with amazing song after amazing song, Ghostory is truly an impressive effort and easily one of the best things I've heard this year.