On a related note, things are gradually getting busier for us in other areas – Liam works full-time and I’ve gone back to school – so the old two posts a day routine might not be maintained too often any more. That said, in an effort to keep things ticking over, we’re going to introduce a new ‘Flash Review’ feature where we cover albums in less words than we would otherwise use. It’s not ideal but a short piece is better than no piece. There’ll still be a good smattering of the usual style too.

Tracklisting:

1. Birthstone (Reprise) – Pet Cemetery
   2. Vice – Roundheels
   3. Forever – Boosegumps
   4. So Long – Heavy Boots
   5. Long Walk To All Sorts of Place – Fanpage
   6. Feathers & Leaves – Ocean Floor
   7. Down Predator Souvenirs – Lejsovka & Freund
   8. Vacation – Florist
   9. 2. – Old Earth
   10. Never Good Enough – Eerie Summer
   11. EZ River – Wilder Maker
   12. Thumbs – Claire Cottrill
   13. If I Were A Portal – Evening Hymns
   14. Jenny Come Home – Andy Shauf
   15. Only Friend – Valley Maker
   16. The Flood – Mike Pace & the Child Actors
   17. Close Call (Adderall Anxiety) – Shaky Shrines
   18. Nancy Kerrigan – Frog
   19. Kaleidoscope – Arbes
   20. The Book of Love – ARMS

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“I chased intimacy and simplicity above perfection and hopefully the songs are, at the very least, honest because of this”

Cooper lists Mount Eerie, Grouper and Bon Iver amongst his influences, and this make total sense once you dig in to the album. ‘Nova’ begins with ambient noise, the bird calls and lazy suburban rumble of traffic, before we get our first taste of Ocean Floor’s acoustic guitar arrangements. The atmosphere is kind of sad but in a lonely sunny afternoon sort of way. ‘Blinding Light’ is a little bleaker, with guitars that would be at home on a Psalmships record, while ‘For Someone Else’ pairs breathy vocals and negative space to create a languidly melodious track. ‘Feathers and Leaves’ is an almost instrumental track which is brighter and more peppy than those prior, fusing folk with something a little more poppy, with little yelpy wooos and la las acting like instruments of their own, reminiscent of Lord Huron.

‘Girl From the States’ is about just that, a love letter to an American girl, while ‘If You Will’ is short and relatively simple but somehow luminous, the guitars twinkling and shining as they get swept up in the pretty melody. ‘Looking at the Sun’ sounds a little like an Elliott Smith song backed with synths like those Strand of Oaks used on earlier albums, and ‘Dusk’ is another instrumental, this one clanging and echoey and vaguely oppressive, like a barely remembered bad dream. The final track is a cover of Daniel Johnstone’s ‘True Love Will Find You in the End’, which ends the album on a heartwarmingly positive note. It’s nice that an album which promises to approach the pains of young adulthood and the failures of relationships ends on a song which (to me at least – I realise people have different interpretations of this song) is as reassuring as they come.

Old Haunts is available now on a pay-what-you-want basis via the Ocean Floor Bandcamp page.

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