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In the end, I believe a certain intellectual honesty is needed, let's say, and we must acknowledge that even a band you really like can produce an album that doesn't work. I think Sam Prekop, John McEntire, Archer Prewitt, and Eric Claridge's Sea And Cake is a legendary band with nothing left to prove: the overall sum of their extensive production since the nineties is of high or even very high (see the eponymous album, "Nassau"...) quality. They are a group of great inventiveness and even seminal in certain sounds, but their latest album, "Any Day" (Thrill Jockey Records), is actually just adequate to the point that it would even seem unfair to compare it to the rest of the Chicago quartet's production. Then, to assert that an album is not very successful doesn't necessarily mean to outright dismiss the artist or band. What I mean is that over the years, a certain type of music criticism has formed, practically on one side having a Ptolemaic attitude, which is typical of perhaps more mainstream press. On the other side, it is partisan or otherwise aligned depending on the circumstances (which very rarely have ideological connotations, perhaps we could speak of "principles," but as a great and shy Italian singer-songwriter said, "when it's said to be principle, it's for money") and dedicated to the practice of the ancient-new art of "cannibalism."
So this album is objectively lackluster and ultimately can fit into what may have been precise compositional choices dedicated to a certain low-intensity pop. From this point of view, I wouldn't say Sea And Cake have betrayed their listeners; a certain lightness (I speak of cadence and certainly not of superficiality or frivolity) has always been constant in their productions, and applying to them a type of "criticism" like those mentioned above would make no sense, and also because "criticism" as something academic makes no sense when applied to someone who has always eluded any categorization and can be defined as authentically "indie" in the original and now forgotten sense of the term.
Among pop-rock ballads like "Cover The Mountain" and "I Should Care" and "Paper Window," tracks in the more typical style of the group like "Occurs," the power-pop of "Starling" and "Day Moon," and compositions with jazz nuances and particulars like "Any Day" and "Circle," the album lacks particular inventiveness and a certain verve. In the same way, it is undoubtedly tenuous, pleasant, delicate, pastel, and indisputably with a certain style, it may still appeal to the most die-hard fans of the band and those seeking spring-like moments of tranquility before the incendiary summer heat.
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