You remember that time when you went through a severe existential crisis after turning 22, you didn’t ask that girl out, you didn’t read that one book you thought would make you more interesting, you still felt too indie for your suburban thanksgiving; so you went and stood in a field with super long prairie grass in central Canada and blasted the entire Living Hour discography while processing your main character syndrome? No? Neither do I. But every time I listen to the Living Hour discography, that's what I feel.

This isn’t a review of a specific album or release, but more so a review of my journey in listening to this band. The goal of this website isn’t to assign numeric values to expressive art, but rather to relay the ways that we interact and portray art. What about these songs speak to us so much? Why did I care enough to resurrect my short-lived amateur music journalism career 4 years later to write about this? If you’re looking for approved opinions, check out Pitchfork or Rolling stone.

Living Hour is a band based out of Winnipeg Manitoba, which is super cold. The band consists of Sam Sarty, Gilad Carroll, Adam Soloway, and Brett Ticzon. The band currently has 3 full length albums “Living Hour” (2016), “Softer Faces” (2019), and “Someday is Today” (2022). My first time listening to Living Hour earlier this year I immediately knew that this was the band that was next in line to carry the torch from Slowdive, Cocteau Twins, and Beach House. This isn’t ambient dream-pop (terrible genre name) or shoegaze though. These are songs that can be both atmospheric and earth shattering at the same time. Songs that make you want to escape reality but also invoke a feeling of awareness. Sam Sarty’s (lead vocalists) voice feels like a unique blend of Victoria Legrande and Elizabeth Frazer. It’s almost as if Elizabeth Frazer wasn’t singing in Gaelic anymore and I could understand the lyrics.

Living Hour: 2016

Self titled is the first album I’ve come across in a while where I would feel wrong shuffling through. The songs in this album most notably from “This is the Place” to “Steady Glazed eyes” blend into each other as chapter’s in a book. It feels wrong to pick and choose songs from this album.

“This is the place” feels like a meditative detox. With every refrain of “your silence is a deep and dark roar” you feel like leaving a problem behind and coping through a super swaggy slow indie headbang to the preceding riff. Maybe Sam was trying to get something off her chest writing this song.

“This is the place” blends into “Steady glazed eyes” better than the barista that blends your overpriced green smoothie. This song will take you to space and back, but the rocket won’t be SpaceX built, It’ll be a rocket of introspection captained by that person who’s always on your mind.

Softer Faces: 2019

“Softer faces” radiates acceptance and healing, almost as if the band got all the angst off their chest in self-titled. “No Past” feels like meditation; stripping the listener into the present moment with punctual instrumentals and lyrics that beg to trade the anxiety of the past with the stillness of presence.

“There is no past

There is no past my dear

Take what can last my dear

Like all of

But your moon that day

Turned around anyway

And the face it showed

Was the same again”

This was the album that I likened to more of a Beach House style. The stories in the Lyrics are more blunt and Sam’s melodies sound similar to Victoria Legrande especially on tracks like “Water”.

Someday is today: 2022

Trying to describe this album feels impossible. It seems as if every song on this album (specifically No Body and Lemons and Gin) has a message buried in between weirdly observational and escapist lyrics. To be honest, that’s what makes it great. It’s completely up to the listener to find a story amongst the observational diary and wintery sounds.

The album opens up with the perfect song that feels like a soft landing into melcoholic longing. Hold me in your mind feels a lot like (again) an early Beach House record. The song closes with the repetition of “And I see your headlights turning on”.... Which feels like longing for something that is slowly disappearing in the fog. Sarty’s lyrics in Lemons and Gin feel like a late night in a grocery store in January while it's raining outside. Yet the ethereal instrumentals and piercing guitar maintain the atmospheric aura of otherwise abstract and melancholic lyrics. The two other tracks that stood out from the crowd were Middle Name, with the beautiful bridge:

The apartment (Sky is dark for after eight)

And it's snowing (Trying to evaporate)

It's extravagant (Sky is dark for after eight)

I'm complaining (Trying to evaporate)

Hold it in my middle name

and Feelings meeting, a grungier sounding song, which had to have been the hardest song ever to mix.

Living Hour is currently touring so catch them at one of their shows if you like their music, I’ll be really eager to take it all in live.

Cover Photo taken from: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2Ho3J07GaGcCl2ePXnjEia