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The third album from psych-pop outfit Sandy\u2019s, Magic Mind<\/i> has a shimmering, multilayered character that may evoke thoughts of Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots<\/i>-era Flaming Lips, early Crowded House and even Pet Sounds<\/i>. Yet it sounds like none of those things; the third album from the Bay Area group is a fully-realized work that showcases the accumulated creative development of the band led by Alexi Glickman.<\/p>\n
The group released its debut, Fourth Dementia<\/i>, in 2014; in the ensuing years, Sandy\u2019s hasn\u2019t exactly churned out new records. Prom<\/i>, a five-song EP, dropped in 2016. Then, save for a few scattered singles, fans of the band\u2019s luxuriant dreamy pop soundscapes have had to wait more than three years for a full-length followup to 2018\u2019s aptly-titled Chime<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Glickman won\u2019t be rushed. \u201cEvery aspect of [the process], from writing to recording to overdubbing to mixing and even mastering, has to be inspired and magic,\u201d he says. And that makes the creative endeavor a lengthy one. \u201cYou kind of have to wait for lightning to strike.\u201d<\/p>\n
You can\u2019t fake that, Glickman insists \u2014 nor can you engineer inspiration into the project if it\u2019s not there. Drawing from another creative discipline, Glickman provides an example to illustrate his point. \u201cYou know how some films are a technological marvel, but they\u2019re not inspired? They don\u2019t do the thing that E.T.<\/i> does. By the time they take off on those bikes, you\u2019re just weeping,\u201d Glickman enthuses. \u201cAnd you don\u2019t know why.\u201d<\/p>\n
His point is that in the best pop music, there\u2019s a kind of emotional manipulation at work. And \u2014 like the moviegoer who engages in suspension of belief so as to enter the filmmaker’s world \u2014 the attentive listener willingly surrenders to the emotional cues set forth in the artist\u2019s music.<\/p>\n
Glickman subscribes to that notion; it\u2019s something he thinks about a great deal. And he appreciates the investment of time and attention that a listener would put into experiencing Magic Mind<\/i>. \u201cThe album we\u2019ve just made is not background music,\u201d he says with a chuckle. \u201cYou don\u2019t cook dinner to it. It\u2019s more like, \u2018Okay, I\u2019m going to put on the headphones and experience this for half an hour; I\u2019m going to trust Sandy\u2019s with my emotions.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
And Glickman believes that trust is well-placed. \u201cI think we’ve earned the right to take you on that journey,\u201d he says. \u201cBecause the process was really authentic. And that\u2019s why I feel okay about putting it out into the world: because it feels true, it feels connected to humanity.\u201d<\/p>\n
Glickman makes a salient point about the characters that inhabit the songs on Magic Mind<\/i>. \u201cThey were us<\/i>,\u201d he says. \u201cThere was no separation between what this album was about and the people who were in the band and our families. This was about mental health; this was about tragedy; this was about loss; this was about depression and mania and addiction.\u201d He stops and laughs, then adds a rhetorical question: \u201cWho the hell wants to spend any time with that?\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
He hopes that the answer is something along the lines of \u201clots of people.\u201d Even though Magic Mind<\/i> isn\u2019t strictly a concept album or one with an overt narrative thread, taken as a whole it does feel like that kind of a record. And that\u2019s by intention. After a suite of pop tunes ranging from 24 seconds to conventional length, the album concludes with its epic title track, running more than eight minutes.<\/p>\n
But the dreamy tune doesn\u2019t waste the listener\u2019s time. \u201cMagic Mind\u201d builds on the soaring, dreamy character of the songs that precede it, folding in Magical Mystery Tour<\/i>-like textures, a bit of shoegaze, some space rock, and an overall feel that recalls Klaatu\u2019s \u201cCalling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft.\u201d After fading to a whisper, the arrangement builds slowly, inexorably toward the Big Ending. It\u2019s an exhilarating payoff.<\/p>\n
For Glickman, beginnings and endings are really important. And in sequencing albums, he looks to DJs for inspiration. \u201cI feel like DJs and people who make mixtapes are even better suited for that than actual musicians themselves,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s a skill that they fine-tune: \u2018What\u2019s the set list? What\u2019s the order?\u2019\u201d Surprisingly, when settling upon the track order for Magic Mind<\/i>, Glickman wasn\u2019t completely sure that the album should close with the sprawling title cut. \u201cIt felt right,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd it felt like a movie. But I wasn\u2019t 100 percent sure; there\u2019s no denouement; things don\u2019t get tied up neatly in a bow at the end.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the record seemed to know how it had to wrap up. \u201cWe didn’t have any extra tracks lying around to [add],\u201d Glickman admits with another chuckle. \u201cAnd so I was like, \u2018Well, shit<\/i>.\u2019 Because at the end of all this, there’s this huge climax, and then there’s all this noise, and then you can kind of hear the buzz of the amps, and the pedal clicks off, and it\u2019s just kind of\u2026\u2018That’s it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Glickman pauses a beat, reflecting on what he\u2019s just described, and realizing that it sounds like the end of a film soundtrack. \u201cOh, shit,\u201d he says, again. \u201cI guess that’s my answer!\u201d<\/p>\n
On some of his other projects, Glickman says he would \u201cget the band \u2014 really creative, awesome people you want to hang out with \u2014 and just jam. Then the record would become an editing project.\u201d Those kinds of records can be made quickly. But a project like Magic Mind<\/i> is a different matter, and Glickman knew it when work began on the album.<\/p>\n
\u201cI put on some of the rough mixes of some of the early songs, and I got this wave of foreboding,\u201d he recalls. \u201cI knew that it had the potential to be really deep and possibly the best one that we had ever done, but I just knew it was going to take a lot of work.\u201d He admits to facing some existential dread at the prospect of making the third Sandy\u2019s album. \u201cPart of me knew that it needed more life to happen, to be put into the songs,\u201d he says. \u201cIt’s like aging a wine or something: it just needs a little more time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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