Rhinestones

HTRK mint their N & J Blueberries label with a startling 5th studio album, finding the duo stripped to a quietlycathartic quintessence of heartbreaking vocals and spectral webs of guitar in a modern, classic and whollyinimitable style.Recorded in their native Dandenong Ranges, Australia, during April-May 2021, ‘Rhinestones’ contains some ofHTRK’s most aching/gratifying songwriting secreted in subtly plangent sheets of dubbed guitar, synth padsand ember crackling 808s. It’s an album that seems to have been precision-tooled for tortured romanticsand atomised souls, reverberating with a gentle pathos and unfurling at an effortless pace that’s practicallytherapeutic.Distilling their form of lowkey emotional manipulations to a fine art, the metaphysical soul of their songcraftsomehow bleeds out more clearly than ever, infusing every song from the heartbreak pucker of ‘Kiss Kissand Rhinestones’ to the intoxicating, spirit-catcher sway of ‘Gilbert and George’ with the tumescent glowof MDMA-tingled flesh and the uncanniest air of déjà vu. All nine songs land like a salve to the senses with amicrodosed sensitivity that reveals every shimmering string, pad and echoic snare contrail like a halo aroundJonnine’s incredible vocals, which regale tales of love and the mysteries of the night with an observant,diaristic directness that has an unshakeable emotive clout.In key with the times, the songs feel like the soundtrack to emptied cities, casting gothic shadows in thespellbinding reverbs of ‘Valentina’ and mottled beauty of ’Siren Song,’ with the fragged ketrock of ‘Fast Friend’imagining a séance with Prince and Anna Domino, while Conrad Standish (CS + Kreme) lends bass guitargilding to the saloon sashay of ‘Real Headfuck,’ and ’Straight To Hell’ basks in a transition between the goldenand crepuscular hours. oh - and ‘Sunlight Feels like Bee Stings’ - what a title?!Put plainly, no other band do it quite like HTRK, and ‘Rhinestones’ feels like their purest iteration, conjured in amist of feeling, love and inebriation.Rhinestones by HTRK