Philly power pop outfit
2nd Grade turn up the rock on their sophomore album
Easy Listening, adding
Stones-y swagger and high-powered riffing to the pop sweetness of their short, melodically charged songs. Both 2020 debut
Hit to Hit and 2021’s demo collection
Wish You Were Here Tour Revisited were patchworks of clean, sentimental songcraft, each offering more than 20 tunes that flew by in a matter of seconds and called on the jangly bittersweetness of pop legends like
Teenage Fanclub,
Guided by Voices,
Sloan, or
Big Star. The band’s romantic hooks and anxious pace are present on
Easy Listening, but the guitars are louder and weightier, the attitudes a little more confident (sometimes to the point of fun brattiness on punky blasts like “Controlled Burn”), and the overall feeling the album evokes is one of summer fun through the lens of an imagined rock & roll nostalgia. In
2nd Grade’s universe of daydreams, the songs call up images of listless summer days at the airshow and restless nights chasing love with classic rock on the radio. “Strung Out on You” ties together the dazed longing and midtempo handclaps of
Girlfriend-era
Matthew Sweet, while “Cover of Rolling Stone” namechecks antiquated elements of different eras -- family landlines, bands famous from MTV airplay and magazine covers--- over anthemic chords and a one-minute-and-14-second runtime. Production approaches vary from song to song. “Beat of the Drum” is full force, driving, and surf-informed party rock recorded in high definition, while “Poet in Residence” slows down a riff borrowed from
John Cougar Mellencamp’s 1982 hit “Hurts So Good” and filters the entire song through a muted, lo-fi filter. The short and drum-free “Planetarium” is equal parts gentle vocal harmonies and phaser-heavy instrumental, landing like a lost
Alien Lanes track, while the closing title track lingers a little longer than most of the other tracks, blanketed in cassette hiss as it wanders through sweetly solitary moods.
Easy Listening is a more full-barreled showing than earlier
2nd Grade efforts, with its moments of celebration and ennui both more vivid and defined. ~ Fred Thomas