Brightness is actually hard to do well in indie music. Too often, it descends into mere sickly sweetness, nauseating ‘up with life’ or overweening celebration, more fit for the Top 40 radio stations and elevators. There are acts who can pull off a song or two in the bright vein on an album, but it’s not their bread & butter. And then there’s Montreal’s Sorry Girls, who do brightness right and thoroughly with Bravo!.
This is because the duo of Heather Foster Kirkpatrick and Dylan Konrad Obront know that ‘bright’ doesn’t automatically equal ‘happy’. Instead, they bring a grander, moving nature to “Breathe”, and more reaching emotion with “Pillar of Salt” (they also know when to bring in a sax solo…). There are distinctly disco-pop tracks on Bravo!, such as the great dance “Other Side”, but also leans into the sadder, Laurel Canyon-esque pop-country on “Aftermath”.
Yes, Bravo! is a decidedly sweet, and yes, ‘bright’, album, but it is shining without being shiny, and there is depth beneath that glow.
