The Artist/Album: The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Belong (Slumberland, March 29th)
The Details: As you’re about to hear in the sample tracks below, Pains’ second LP ups their studio game considerably, contrasting Kip Berman’s sun-stroked melodies with battering ram riffs that recall none other than Smashing Pumpkins. Sure enough, Flood produced the thing. Yes, that Flood–the one who’s manned the boards for Depeche Mode, PJ Harvey, Nine Inch Nails, and a bunch of other bands who epitomize our teenage wasteland years. (He also worked on the Pumpkins’ flawless double album, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.)
“It was like a fantasy world,” Berman said of the sessions in a Pitchfork interview. “I mean, a band on our level just doesn’t have those experiences ever. These people were involved in the records that inspired us to make music.”
By “these people,” he also means mixer Alan Moulder, who’s worked with My Bloody Valentine, Ride, the Jesus and Mary Chain…do we even need to go on? Consider us very psyched to hear this one in full. For now, here are the first two singles from the record…
