Twin Oaks are a two-piece from Los Angeles that consists of multi-instrumentalist Aaron Christopher and songwriter Lauren Brown. The duo released their latest EP, Not an Exit, late last year but it’s only now I’m getting around to writing about it.
Not An Exit is dreamy in more ways than one. The overall sound could be pegged at ‘Dream Pop’ and filed next to Lemolo or Fiona Apple, although the slighly fuzzy and minimal instrumentation conveys a slow serene imagining rather than some vividly ethereal fantasy. The result is a collection of songs that sound confidently crafted and fully controlled, holding the hand of the listener through beautiful oneiric landscape they have created. The EP bubbles away until (my personal favourite) ‘Shipwreck’ dares to break through a little more with it’s desperate refrain. It drags the listener back from the comfortable meander they had enjoying presents the always-just-masked emotion for all to see. It’s a cleverly put together piece that deserves to be played in order.
The other aspect of dreaminess on Not An Exit runs through the lyrics. On ‘Not An Exit’ Brown sings ’Wake up darlin’, wake up to a lucid dream’ and the line heralds the themes across the album. On each song there are references to dreams; Maybe not bona fide nighttime-in-bed dreams, but psychological constructs that we all experience. Imaginings and fantasies, fears and worries, they are all running through these songs to produce something that is paradoxically very real (as in recognisable) while also being fictitious (in that we have no way of directly observing or measuring them).
The fact that I’ve looked so deeply (too deeply?) into these songs is a testament to this duo. They create music that demands repeated listens and makes you think a little more than maybe you would normally, which for a Dream Pop band (a genre which is often focussed solely on nice sounds as a form of escapism) is no mean feat. Buy the EP on Bandcamp where you can also download the title track free of charge.