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Letting Off the Happiness
Folk · 1998 · 10 tracks

Letting Off the Happiness

A shaky, tape-hissed portrait of midwestern isolation. Quivering vocals and cheap drum machines collide in a beautiful, desperate mess of adolescent existentialism.

September 2, 1998 · Dead Oceans

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A desperate, shivering vulnerability that finds beauty in the wreckage of a young mind.

Tracklist · 10 Tracks
01
If Winter Ends
3:27
02
Padraic My Prince
3:50
03
Contrast and Compare
3:59
04
The City Has Sex
2:14
05
The Difference in the Shades
4:25
06
Touch
3:44
07
June on the West Coast
3:36
08
Pull My Hair
4:12
09
A Poetic Retelling of an Unfortunate Seduction
4:26
10
Tereza and Tomas / Contrast and Compare (version)
25:47
Moments Worth Listening For
The desperate, cracking scream at the climax of If Winter Ends that sounds like a physical breaking point.
The jarring transition into the mechanical, cold beat of The City Has Sex.
The fragile, hushed vocal interplay on Contrast and Compare that feels like eavesdropping on a private collapse.

How does Letting Off the Happiness sound next to the rest of Bright Eyes's catalogue?

Winter+2.3σ

Winter saturates this record far more than the artist's norm.

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