The Staircase is the debut album by modern synth pop duo Sharpie Smile, thankfully this album isn't tedious in the ways the TV series The Staircase was. The duo are Dylan Hadley and Cole Berliner, who were previously in Kamikaze Palm Tree and The Staircase was produced by Cesar Maria, with additional musical assistance from Laena Myers and Leng Bian. The band celebrate the albums release by embarking on a two-month long US tour that opens with the album Launch show at The Zebulon in Los Angles on June 30th.
The album opens with the statement "It all feels like its going down the drain" that are the opening lyrics to Bells, that gives a hint at where the album will go lyrically in tune with the times, with a odd Synth pop backing.
Disappears has soft pretty synth pop passages with the odd nasty incursion, for a song about a relationship that has fallen to bits and how they want to just Disappear before all the tears become too much.
The Slide is the albums main single that has the autotuned vocals, wavering between almost drum and bass percussion, with sylph like synths, creating the sort of modern pop that's both compelling and a little discombobulating to ancient ears like mine.
Answer that question, the pleas she makes to try to figure out what went wrong. Trying to figure out how to repair the damage and keep on loving each other, something that can only happen once you answer before the guitar solo ends.
Love Or Worship which will it be, you're allowed a choice, but she needs to know, that you must do one or preferably both, then everything will work out, the hazy synth pop backing makes this remind me of current pop acts like Lucy Dacus.
So Far features Leng Bian on this drum & Bass synth evocation of the need to leave, you beg and plead that this is not the end. Brick Or Stone is slower almost elegiac look at the ruins of love lost, figuring out how to carry on breathing, so you can move on. This comes to some sort of resolution, the song building magisterially towards its climax.
New Flavor is chamber synthpop with pulsing club twists, in celebration of the latest allegedly greatest New Flavor available. The Letter sounds nothing like The Box Tops immortal hit, that is one of the first songs I ever remember hearing. This is slow strummed acoustic guitar, adorned with synths and slow auto tune inflected vocals, intoning The Letters contents, spilling out the emotional pain that's left you unable to feel anymore.
The album closes with The Staircase one last slice of loves pains, things have gone completely, the synths try to ease the pain, but really it must be time to move on, the strings seem to be paced, like you're briskly walking away, rather than sitting at home crying into to your bubble chai.
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