*. Constants .*

Album: Pasiflora (2012)
Genre: Prog Rock (Post Rock/Shoegaze/Indie)  /  USA

Imagine progressive rock, indie rock and dreampop get combined. Sounds strange? Well, CONSTANTS just did so on their new album, Pasiflora, and – even if I really wouldn’t have expected an album like this I’m in love with it to the max. Pasiflora opens with the wonderful song Sunrise and it even feels like the sun is rising when listening to this song. All in all the album leaves you in the mood of a warm summer evening at the beach or in the park having some of the best hours of your life with your friends and the people you love. After the bands 2010 album, If Tomorrow The War, was pretty heavy I didn’t expect Pasiflora to be this wonderful, round and laid-back. With their fifth studio album CONSTANTS reveal a very different side of theirself. With an emphasis on shoegaze and an almost retro-sensibility. Whispering vocal harmonies, walls of chorused synths and booming PETER GABRIELesque drums coalesce into an album landing somewhere between M83 and MEW. Simply put, Pasiflora without any doubt is the band’s best and most creative release yet. “We aim to surprise people with every record and like to work outside of our own safe zone as much as possible. The challenge is to shape the result into a clear, consistent album,” says guitarist/vocalist Will Benoit. “We’re genuinely excited to have found something fresh at a point in our timeline when a lot of bands become stagnant.” Pasiflora was self-produced in Benoit’s Radar Studios (JUNIUS, CASPIAN) - which by the way is New England’s first and only solar-powered recording facility - and co-mixed by Daryl Rabidoux (BAD RABBITS, THE CANCER CONSPIRACY).
Earlier this year we interviewed the band and Will told us:
We definitely have another drastic change in sound this time around! I mentioned earlier, these days we are really embracing our 90s shoegaze side, so this album is full of really dreamy songwriting. Our drummer Rob came up with a lot of the basic patterns and melodies this time, and I’m also singing very differently… from people who’ve heard it, we’ve heard a lot of different comparisons, but the feedback has been really good so far. Read the entire interview here. As he says, CONSTANTS want to surprise people, and so they did with Pasiflora. I just can speak for myself and I definitely was thinking of a completely other album. But to be honest: So far Pasiflora is the best surprise (in sense of a band’s new album) of 2012. Check this out, this could be your soundtrack of this year’s summer! Review by "Robert Helbig"(http://nothingbuthopeandpassion.com).

RATING:  6.75 / 10

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