We’ve covered Jason Calhoun’s ambient project Naps a few times already, calling One Hundred Percent Confident “a lesson in patient prettiness” and likening the more recent ft to “a midnight ecosystem that’s invisible to the masses, received serendipitously by late night drivers and insomniacs, an electronic blanket to wrap around their quiet and mundane lives.” We were very happy then to learn that Calhoun is back with Happy All The Time Forever Always, a new series of “heartbreaking vignettes” on LA’s Bridgetown Records. As we’ve come to expect from Naps, the songs exist as lush swirls of instrumentation, mists and fogs which seep through your ears and line the inside of your head, offering a layer of protection from reality. The opening handful of tracks are short, most failing to reach the 1:30 mark, though beneath their brevity lies a wonderful depth. While tracks such as ‘Clean’ and ‘Walk’ are slow and ponderous and undoubtedly sad, a gentle warmth shines through the haze, like a small, bone-warming gap in autumnal clouds.
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This sets the tone for the rest of the album, the sombre vibe contrasted with moments of small beauty that make you stop and stare and smile despite yourself. ‘Clouds’ is propped up by the calming nostalgia of a gentle tide, while ‘Headache’ and ‘Relax’ flutter with a soft glow, electronic buzzes and beeps washed beneath a bittersweet sensation that can’t quite be translated into words. It’s something to do with a balance between good and bad, longing desperately for something while simultaneously harbouring the quiet belief it might just come true. Closer ‘Nothing’, by far the longest track on the album, captures this perfectly. Woven from the kind of melancholy you experience when looking out over some impressive view, the song holds a strange joyful sadness you can wrap close to your body as a reminder that you are alive.
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Happy All The Time Forever Always is out now and you can buy it from the Bridgetown Records Bandcamp page or their website, or get a name-your-price download via the naps Bandcamp page.
