Wesley Schultz and Jeremiah Fraites’ fourth studio album as The Lumineers is an indie folk-rock treatise on identifying and striving for hope—released at a moment in time when optimism may not feel like the prevailing mood.
Comforts abound: on the title track, “BRIGHTSIDE,” which wasrecorded in a single day and serves as a love song for everyone; on “A.M. RADIO,” an acoustic narrative ditty with a salon sing-along chorus, featuring touring members Byron Isaacs and Lauren Jacobson, Cindy Mizelle, The Felice Brothers’ James Felice, and singer-songwriter Diana DeMuth; on the tear-jerking piano ballad “ROLLERCOASTER”; and on the Springsteen-informed stomper “NEVER REALLY MINE.” If there is a thesis statement to BRIGHTSIDE, it’s “WHERE WE ARE,” with its ascending piano melody and the affirming chorus, “Where we are/I don’t know where we are/But it will be okay.”
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