IN REVIEW: Hey Rosetta! - "Second Sight"

There's a telling lyrical passage that stuck out to me upon listening to Newfoundland-based indie stalwarts Hey Rosetta's third full-length LP. During the uplifting, depression-battling anthem Cathedral Bells, singer Tim Baker exclaims, "the road is lit and I'm going home". It comes near the tail end of the album's most thrilling section of songs, during which the seven-piece (plus additional hands on deck for extra orchestration) take a formidable musical journey through several genres and moods. After exploring the arena-sized farthest reaches of Coldplay, the worldly rhythms of Vampire Weekend and the zealous, choral flourishes of Arcade Fire among others, it's the comfort of home that drives the group down the album's (pun intended, I suppose) home stretch.

Long before we get to that point, however, we're treated to some of the band's most interesting material to date. The album starts with current single Soft Offering (for the Oft Suffering) and runs through some massively appealing melodies, culminating in the earworm-inducing, supersized Dream. What follows is a slower, more introspective pair of tracks in What Arrows and Promise; they're not bad songs, but they do kill the momentum with their tempos and tendencies to drag on just a bit (they're a shade under twelve minutes combined).

Thankfully, the album's midsection finds Hey Rosetta! at their most adventurous, bombastic and lively; the groovy, methodical Kid Gloves, the fiery and percussive Neon Beyond, the nimble and enticing Kintsukuroi and the aforementioned Cathedral Bells run the gamut in seventeen minutes, laying bare all of this incredibly talented group's strengths. It also sets the table for even more thrills in the slow burning dirge turned hopeful ballad Alcaltraz, the soulful kitchen party atmosphere of Harriet (which contains the album's biggest payoff), and the hymnal, heartbreaking requiem Trish's Song.

As musically restless as Second Sight tends to be, it also feels like a natural progression for a band that's already shown plenty of willingness to experiment. If they continue to remind predominantly of the three other bands I've already mentioned previously, they're to be commended for only gleaning the positive elements of those bands' influences. It may sound like Coldplay, Vampire Weekend or Arcade Fire, but it's Coldplay without the inflated sense of importance, Vampire Weekend without the forced book smarts, and Arcade Fire without the heavy-handed pretensions. It's the earnestness and honesty that make Second Sight, and Hey Rosetta!, so easy to root for; this album is the sound of a band that, for all the national adulation they've received (two Polaris nominations and, if the quality of this record is any indication, counting), and for all the global-minded inspirations that creep into their core sound, they still haven't forgotten where they came from.

October 21, 2014 • Sonic/Warner

Highlights Soft Offering (for the Oft Suffering) • Cathedral Bells • Harriet