Sun Smash Palace – Sun Smash Palace

Sun Smash Palace is one of those bands with an interesting background story. The group comprises musicians from Germany, Brazil, Canada, and South Korea, who altogether lived in Seoul, South Korea, at the time. The passion for music gathered these individuals who also shared a similar interest in music. Each one of them played in bands before, so they all equally contributed to the making of their debut full-length material. This line-up remained steady for two years until vocalist and rhythm guitarist Eric Busse relocated to Luxembourg, where he founded brand new band members to fill in. A brand new line-up consists of Italian and French members, so Sun Smash Palace keeps remains as an international band as much as possible. Today, I will talk a bit more about their full-length record.

Their self-titled debut carries nine melodic indie-rock compositions which differ from those tunes delivered by other contemporaries. Perhaps they share the same music genre, but it seems Sun Smash Palace are leaning more towards some other genres as the album proceeds. Besides indie rock, you may hear a subtle presence of surf rock and a more dominant presence of nineties rock, seventies psychedelic rock’n’roll, classic rock’n’roll, hard rock, and dream pop. Perhaps this list of complementary subgenres of rock music may seem a little over the top, but the group thoroughly planned each composition. Therefore, these explorations into other music genres are not spoiling all the fun. Quite the contrary, most of them are decorating and enhancing these numbers on an entirely new level.

This material serves as perfect summertime music and perhaps an ideal beach time soundtrack, mainly because of the calmy, chill, reverby atmosphere that it delivers through each following composition. The subtle echoic atmosphere appeals to the listening apparatus, while the crystal clear chants are liberating nearly cathartic tones. Sun Smash Palace calls out its listeners to calm down and relax because happiness is the only important thing in life, especially in these troubling times when we’re all suppressed by tremendous amounts of stress. There’s a particular dosage of cheerfulness hidden within each composition, but it is not overwhelming the indie rock aesthetics of the group. The rock’n’roll side of this band gives enough drive and dynamics, but you should expect a couple of nearly dream-pop songs that are perfectly matching with the remaining portion of the material.

You’ll be pleasantly surprised by the positiveness of this recording. Sun Smash Palace gave their best to sound different, fresh, unique, and they nailed in their intentions. The album is available at streaming services such as Spotify, so head over to their page and give it a listen.