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Pastels / Tenniscoats - Two Sunsets

Album Reviews

A sweet record of patchy loveliness, rather than a heart stopping work of staggering genius that, perhaps naively, we’d been quietly hoping for.

Imagine a record made by a bunch of people from Glasgow and Tokyo, and what would you expect? How about something occasionally bordering on ambient, sometimes veering down an easy listening, 60s French-style vibe? ‘Two Sunsets’, the resulting collaboration between revered Scottish indie types The Pastels and hip electronic Japanese duo Tenniscoats, as you might be suspecting, is nothing like your expectations. It’s been a long time in the making, recorded over the space of three years, usually based around when Tenniscoats were touring in the UK. Unfortunately the end result of this extended, sprawling recording process is often unfocused and dazed, as if the music might well be suffering from the band’s collective jetlag.

Opener ‘Tokyo Glasgow’ sets the dreamlike hazy pace, sounding as if it’s lifted straight from a cooler-than-cool Sofia Coppola film – you know the type, with lots of willowy girls floating around in difficult relationships with troubled young arty blokes. The single ‘Vivid Youth’ is a warm glow of a track, bouncing along with an infectious optimism, providing a perfect soundtrack to the first date with someone you think might turn out to be a bit special. ‘About You’ is something the Jesus and Mary Chain might have come up with if they had spent their youths listening to a load of Serge Gainsbourg in the sunsoaked South of France instead of brooding under the ominous slate grey skies of Scotland. Frustratingly for every mildly tedious track like ‘Boats’ (which quivers along insubstantially for no apparent reason whatsoever) there is a perky little gem like ‘Sodane’ which Pizzicato Five would have sold their last pair of kinky boots to have written, a masterclass in effortless breezy pop perfection.

It would be a pleasure to say ‘Two Sunsets’ is a perfect collaboration - but we’d be big evil liars if we did. Like so many things that seem fantastic in theory, it just doesn’t quite sparkle as you’d hoped it might on actual listening. Maybe expectations were too high – which is not to say it’s a poor album, just that it’s got a certain something missing from the core of it, with not enough consistent va-va-voom to keep you switched on from beginning to end. The end result is a sweet record of patchy loveliness, rather than a heart stopping work of staggering genius that, perhaps naively, we’d been quietly hoping for. Rating: 7/10