In June of 2016, Whitney dropped onto the indie scene with their debut album “Light Upon the Lake. ”In the months since, it has garnered its fair share of attention on Spotify, with the first track on the album amassing a respectable 5.8 million streams. Within the first few seconds of the album, it’s not hard to tell what the hype is about.
Whitney is unlike much else on the scene right now from an overall view. Though extremely varied in its influences and accentuations, Whitney’s sound blends together so well that it feels as though you’ve always known this album, waiting for it to appear and create that warm, fuzzy feeling that it does so well. The instruments used to create it are an unexpected, varied hodgepodge that blend seamlessly together.
Starting with the foundation of most every song, the vocals on “Light Upon the Lake” are delivered with a soft sincerity, pitched in falsetto and treated with just a touch of reverb. They come across less like a whisper and more like a folksy tangent delivered by your favorite neighbor. In direct complement to the vocals are the guitars. The lead guitar is that familiar warm, moderately high pitched plucking that wouldn’t be out of place on a lively Allman Brothers song. It’s clean, and has that beautiful quality that only a proper tube amp can provide. Bluesy and folksy at the same time, the lead goes hand in hand with the background acoustic, which on some songs plays chords, and on some follows along in a flurry of Travis picking, similar to flamenco or jazz stylings depending on the song. Remarkably, the sounds flow together very well.
Also depending on the song, the background instrumentation will be either a smooth brass section, a touch of woodwind, some light organ or piano, or in some cases, a mix of all of the above. No matter the song or instruments used, “Light Upon the Lake” still maintains one incredibly coherent sound that works incredibly well. It’s a smooth blend of blues, folk and indie, with little hints of other genres scattered throughout. “Light Upon the Lake” is at once catchy, smooth, soft, and not without backbone. The album conjures up the image of the lazy afternoon, or the warm lakeside homestead. It brings forth feelings of ennui, hope, acceptance and joy, without being a bizarre emotional rollercoaster.
“Light Upon the Lake” manages to be consistent without being boring. It brings forth a great variety not just in instruments, accentuation and musical stylings, but also in type of song and feeling. Whitney demonstrates a remarkable amount of skill and polish that is frankly quite rare for a debut album. The mastering is incredibly well done too; all parts seem to fit together perfectly and never drown anything else out. There aren’t any notable examples of an out of place effect being added in post, and indeed, there may not have been much of any digital manipulation.
Through and through, this album is thoroughly fantastic. Highly recommended for indieheads looking for something new and original, “Light Upon the Lake” bestows that warm, contented feeling that you never knew you always wanted. With this level of polish and quality, Whitney’s next album should be on every indie fanatic’s watch list.
