Brightest Color – Ocarina (2016)

Brooklyn’s independent duo, Brightest Color, have released their newest EP Ocarina. This may only be a three track album, but the dense complexity and pith of each song feels as though this could be a full-length LP.

Opener ‘Inertia’ bares a fitting name because its tight minimalist drums, multi-layered guitars and synths, and group vocals reflect Brightest Color’s fluent, ever-evolving songwriting. With a balanced sense of repetition throughout ‘Ocarina’, the two-piece’s catchy melodies and choruses work their way into the back of your head, reinforcing the validity of “math-pop”. With less tension and a straight-forward riff to start, the second song, ‘Lighthouse’, nods to pop and indie influences and reveals Brightest Color’s mathy tendencies. The resonating vocal harmonies call to mind the recognizable sounds of other bands like Philharmongrel, Tall Ships, and Former Monarchs. The soothing closer ‘Vessels’ is a chill-inducing combination of post-rock and energetic math-rock. The underpinning guitar melody echoes post-rock heavyweights like Explosions in the Sky, Dialects, or sleepmakeswaves, and the fluctuating dynamics and phrasing is clever, creative and highly listenable.

With this being the third EP under their belt, Brightest Color have shown progress through their self-produced work, clearly improving on their sound quality and songwriting methods. It may be concise, but Ocarina’s well-rounded release is refreshing, intriguing, and very re-playable.