Aluminum Fully Beat

The relatively short life of San Francisco's Aluminum has sofar yielded a single (Spinning Backwards, 2020) and an EP(Windowpane, 2022), but their debut LP, Fully Beat,overflows with tenured confidence and a singular style thatdeftly comprises shoegaze, big beat, and jangle pop. Withinfluences ranging from Orbital, to Wipers, to TheAvalanches and Sly and the Family Stone, theirs is amultifaceted take on established forms, fed through fuzz andled by honeyed, male-female vocal harmonies from Bay Areapost-punk veterans Marc Leyda (of Wild Moth) and RyannGonsalves (of Torrey)."Smile" begins with deceptive sparseness, adding neon swirlsof stacked tremolo over a mesmerizing lyrical refrain, andhinting at the dynamism to come with understated grace andgrit. "Always Here, Never There" is Fully Beat's first pure hitof melodic pop: it's liquid bass groove winds beneath amelancholy-sweet synth hook and Leyda's plaintive vocals,while drummer Chris Natividad's deep, pillowy snare andpropulsive style maintain a driving pace.Lead single, "Behind My Mouth", shifts gears into a big beatshuffle and howl of overdriven guitars, which relent toGonsalves' rolling bassline and playful, snarky vocal.Composed across several weeks of experimentation, it is aprime iteration of Aluminum's meticulous world of sound, whichnevertheless carries an air of wry nonchalance. Asking, "Doyou ever see behind my mouth?", Gonsalves notes that thesong "comes from a place of wanting to be understoodauthentically, and to communicate intentionally."This approach speaks to the album's broader theme ofexhaustion amid the demands of the modern grind: workingunfulfilling jobs to pay exorbitant rent, feeling society break atthe seams, and trying to maintain a meaningful personal lifewith the remaining scraps of morale. The response, then, mustbe to find joy. These songs were crafted over a half-dozenmonths in basements and practice spaces, creating anabundance of authentic passion and catharsis that's asnostalgic and comforting as a cherished, tattered band t-shirt.The closer, "Upside Down", is a full-throttle blare of joyousrelease - "a straight-up love song," according to Leyda. Thedeliberate choice to end it with a gradual fade, rather than adramatic climax, smartly suggests the ambivalence ofacceptance - perhaps fitting, when considering the immensityof the album's subject matter. It also hints that there is muchmore to be said, and as such a rich and compelling debut, FullyBeat shows that Aluminum are only getting started.