I don’t refer to the pandemic in the past tense – it’s still very much with us, and the effects are still just as deadly for some. We managed to evade COVID until this past December, and while our cases weren’t extreme, there were some extremely scary after-effects. So we’re still masking up in crowds, trying to avoid a repeat. But at least we are able to interact, see friends, be about in the world.
That was not the case when this came out. Lake Street Dive issued this as a direct-sale and indie store release in March 2021, when we were still waiting to get vaccines and have some safety in going about the world. It seemed a bold act to put out new music at the time, but it also made sense. Through the darkest days of the pandemic, particularly the lockdown, the only thing that got us through was music and the musicians – the established artists and local favorites who provided livestreams from their living rooms every week, the local friends who did the same, the little open mic communities who struggled to do our thing over Zoom. It was the arts that showed us why we wanted to live; it’s always the arts.
Up until this time, I didn’t have any Lake Street Dive music, but through YouTube had become enamored of a number of their songs and some stuff Rachael Price had done on her own, like a cover of Blind Faith’s “Can’t Find My Way Home.” So when it was announced this would be released and sold direct, I hopped on it, and this hopeful, poppy little record became the soundtrack for that spring – a spring when we needed some hope.
“Hypotheticals” is just jazz-pop perfection, and “Know That I Know” and “Hush Money” have a similarly zesty feel – just great upbeat music for a downbeat time. “Same Old News” would have shot up the charts in the ’70s as a soul duet (and I always want to hear more of Akie Bermiss’s vocals). There are some heartfelt but not heavy tracks like “Being A Woman” and “Feels Like The Last Time.” And the soft lament of “Sarah” is such a perfect album closer that it always makes me think of “Songbird” on “Rumours” – it’s just reminiscent of how softly, sweetly and sadly that album closed out.
It was this record that sent me off on a Lake Street Dive buying spree, and I thank the band for giving us a little bright spot of hope in a dark time.
