Southern Shores return in 2023 with new EP, Anyplace There Is - a body of work most akin to Atlantic in its melodic choices and introspective atmospheres. It’s a palette from which they paint their best work. Music that stirs the imagination with warmth and melancholy. A complex emotional landscape that suggests all can be, will be, right in the world once we make peace with the moment.
Anyplace There Is was written over the last two years in Jamie and Ben’s studio in downtown Toronto, with the bulk of the material coming together after an international trip. “We had a big spin across Spain last year and were reminded of the sense of vitality and energy that travel provides. What you hear on the record is a sliver of the places and ideas that we distill down from.” The songs all drift at the pace of life. Flecks of tropicalia fade into the mix, as well as deep house, Balearic and downtempo music. As a collection, it has the feeling of something once lost, now recovered. Single one is “Sweet Again,” pulling from the classic Shores recipe: four-on-the-floor beat, xylophone and vocal sample. The sentiment is simple, but sincere. Single two, “We Dream,” sees horns and piano keys dance atop a midtempo rhythm section. Elsewhere the music is equally transportive, built around evocative vocal samples, from which the melodies and drum parts take their form. A key differentiator on this EP, versus previous ones, is that the music was made with a collection of drum machines and synths (mostly classic Roland, Korg, E-mu Romplers), whereas earlier songs relied upon software virtual instruments and sample layering for instrumentation. The boys also credit a backdrop of 80’s pop to helping shape the music: “We were both listening to a lot of Blue Nile during this production. The mood they conjure is singular and led to a sense of spaciousness that was novel for us.”
For over 10 years, Southern Shores have excelled at imbuing their music with a global worldview and a distinctly human spirit. On Anyplace There Is they explore the interior - the landscape inside us comprised of the many people, places, past hurts and future hopes we forever carry.
