To put it simply, Beach House are gorgeous. Rarely are bands able to create music that is hypnotically addictive after a single listen, leaving us craving total surrender to shimmering sonic clouds. Melding velvety synths with silky vocals, dream-pop Baltimore duo Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally have perfectly refined the lo-fi woozy fuzz of their previous three albums into elegantly textured landscapes on Bloom. 

Indeed, this choice of title is as beautifully precise as the compressed perfection of the music; from twinkling simplistic openings, songs blossom into lush choruses just as the tones of the whole album swell and fall with controlled intensity.

Despite this unified quality resulting from the seamless flow of excellent songs, certain tracks shine brightest in the misty backdrop of swirling instruments. Lead single ‘Myth’ is a slow-burning potion of cascading guitars grounded by gravelly synths, succumbing to the caress of Legrand’s dark, languid vocals. The lyrics ask “What comes after this momentary bliss?” The answer is that we don’t care as long as she keeps weaving this intoxicating mesh of sounds.

While ‘New Year displays similarly airy melodies propelled by clattering drums, it also reveals an aptitude for exquisite, anthemic choruses replicated in the seductive ‘Lazuli’. Finally, the tight, glittering pop of ‘Other People’ and the ramblingly mesmerizing ‘Irene’ display the band’s emerging versatility and aural depth, expanding upon the fleeting, hazy tunes of 2010’s Teen Dream.

While there isn’t a radical transformation of their previous work, moving to the prestigous Sub Pop label has initiated an understated evolution of their musical formula. While the inevitable synths, piano and organ still enrich Legrand’s wistful lyrics before being drenched in dense layers of sound, there is a new clarity and crystallized energy to their music as a result of increasingly memorable melodies.

Throughout the album, the luminous sweetness and power of Legrand’s voice remains a fiercely addictive force, wine-rich and mirroring the husky tones of Nico. Criticising the lack of dramatic climaxes would be to ignore the fact that Beach House are sublime by virtue of their swooning, expansive consistency; they require obsessive listening on repeat, as their meticulously crafted songs gleam rather than flash, burn rather than explode.

This isn’t an album of brash pop hooks; this is wonderfully drowsy shoegaze creating, as the refrain in Irene describes, “a strange paradise” of sounds in which it is possible to escape.