{"product_id":"lean-year-sides","title":"Lean Year - Sides","description":"\u003cp\u003eThere is a moment on Sides, the new album from Richmond, Virginia-based duo Lean\r\nYear, in which a hospital room floor is filled with white chrysanthemums. This imagery,\r\nbased on an opiate-induced hallucination experienced by vocalist Emilie Rex's mother\r\nas she recovered from surgery, is a perfect encapsulation of the band's second album:\r\ndreamlike and beautiful, yet burdened with cold, stark reality. Sides is a harrowing\r\njourney through realms of grief and memory, a meditation woven into a tapestry of synth\r\npads, woodwinds, and Rex's instantly recognizable voice. \r\nThe duo of Rex and Rick Alverson-who also works as a film director (The Mountain,\r\nEntertainment, The Comedy)-originally set out to write an album about conflict, but\r\nduring the writing and recording process, they were confronted with a number of\r\npersonal tragedies. Alverson lost both of his parents in rapid succession, Rex's mother\r\nreceived a cancer diagnosis, and the couple's beloved family dog, Orca, died. These\r\nevents transformed the album into an exploration of loss-an attempt at processing the\r\npainful, complex, and private emotions that bubble to the surface when confronted with\r\ndeath. \"We thought we'd do a concept album called Sides where we could reflect on all\r\nof the division in the world, and some in our own families, but then COVID transformed\r\neverything\/everyone, and we suffered our own specific losses. The record became\r\nabout loss and grief,\" Rex explains. \"In this way, the title Sides was still appropriate: our\r\nindividual grief and collective grief, the margins of before and after, the act and feeling\r\nof during and enduring. It felt like straddling a threshold between two opposing\r\nsides-the moment before conflict and the moment after it passes, life and death, the act\r\nof living and the memory of the act. Grief feels like a contention between what you knew\r\nand what you now know, and often both feel real and unreal at once. \"\r\nSides-produced by Alverson alongside Erik Hall (In Tall Buildings) and featuring\r\ncontributions from Elliot Bergman (Nomo, Wild Belle) and Joseph Shabason (Destroyer,\r\nThe War on Drugs)-has a distinctly cinematic quality, perhaps due in part to Alverson's\r\nother career. Moments of jazz, slowcore, and dirgelike R\u0026amp;B find their way into the sorrowful, ambient suite, lulling the listener into a state of calm while the lyrics speak of ghosts,\r\nchildhood, and mortality. Despite the gravity of the subject matter, Sides succeeds in\r\nmastering a balancing act between pathos and pop. Each song is indelible and\r\nhaunting, with melodies that have the kind of broad appeal reminiscent of Karen Dalton,\r\nAldous Harding, and FKA twigs.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Alliance Entertainment","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45297687331121,"sku":"843563149744","price":24.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0704\/2026\/7313\/files\/4113767-2852671.jpg?v=1684201963","url":"https:\/\/vinyl.com\/products\/lean-year-sides","provider":"Vinyl.com","version":"1.0","type":"link"}