Following on from Wins Above Replacement, a full-length album which used sports metaphors to chart the peaks and troughs of everyday existence, the amazing Lorenzo Landini has been releasing a series of new songs in recent months to show off a new direction for the project. “New single ‘Leave No Trace’ sees Landini adopt a newly polished style without sacrificing the immediacy and charm which made the previous album so striking,” we wrote back in July. “Again the mood splits the difference between playfulness and sincerity, the vocals full of searching questions and wry humour, with a rock energy coming to drive the track forward and towards its cathartic conclusion.”
Latest offering ‘Rockaway’ continues in this vein, another song which packages contradiction within a bright and playful sound. What Landini describes as “a YOLO song for the overeducated and underpaid,” the track carries that signature blend of earnest emotion and deprecating humour, occupying a space between nostalgic longing and existential dread where we are left to scrabble for comfort wherever we might find it. “Best time of my life, full happiness, fullest myself-ness,” as Landini sings. “Think about how much worse it gets, how short this will all be / banish the lesser fears, remember the big ones / for a moment we’re together / to laugh and cry, share and grieve.” But within this consolation blooms a real fondness. For what is life if not a train ride towards an inevitable destination?
when the time comes, you’ll know just what to do
you’re gonna bury me in East New York, on the way to the beach