The formation of Baby Smith reads like some special kind of serendipity. Its members – Ray Sonder and Saxon Gable – were both born on the east coast of Australia, where they grew up with a diet of Nirvana and the Beatles thanks to their parents. Sonder and Gable became musicians at their own hand, learning to write and record in their youth and eventually distributing their own demos while they were at university. Life transpired that they both moved from Sydney to Berlin within two weeks of each other after university, where they eventually came to meet. Call it fate or chance, but it was definitely meant to be; they bonded over the music of their childhood and the couple were soon married. In 2023 they began Baby Smith and their formal musical journey together.
After a pair of EPs last year, Baby Smith finally unfurl their debut album, Lately, Love Is Dead. It’s not quite the romantic title you might expect given their backstory but it speaks to the duo’s musical influence and fixation. There is a root in whimsy and infectious melody as much as there is in texture and simmering discontent. (They also cite French fashion designer André Courrèges, French painter Suzanne Valadon, and American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat as influences.) At its best moments, Lately, Love Is Dead is both sweetly catchy and downtrodden, marrying both worlds with what feels like a seamless ease. Take album highlight “Walkie Talkie”, which has Sonder and Gable working with a perfect formula as they detail a one-sided romance. “You always tell me I should run for cover / You still want me, right?,” Sonder sings with a pining sorrow. It’s languid and lazy, forlorn and dazed, and is an earworm that lingers long after the song is done.
There are plenty of other moments that come with the stickiness of PVC glue. Opening track “Adored” is a pleasing entrance, decorated with plenty of colour as Sonder chastises a drug-fuelled admirer. “You only call me when you want to be adored,” she warns. “That ain’t love.” The title track is pure downcast rain-by-the-window balladry, strings coming in during the floating chorus to add to the melancholy. “Have I Lost Myself Or Sense Of Melody” sticks around just long enough before the soft thrum of its chorus starts to wear thin while the Radiohead-inspired “All I Do” piques your attention as piano shifts to staccato chords during the chorus. “All I do / I do for love,” Sonder sings, encapsulating the heart of the record in a quick remark.
Like acts that have come before them (The Bird and the Bee, Kisses, and Chairlift come to mind), Baby Smith show themselves keen and able to pinpoint that sweet indie pop magic. It’s nothing wildly new, but to its credit, it doesn’t sound like it is working from exactly the same songbook or synth settings. That said, sometimes it floats by like a colourful cloud, wanting of more distinction and idiosyncrasy, especially during moments where Sonder’s words get lost in a candyfloss softness, leaving pointed barbs to become cushiony toy hammers.
It’s the additional players who help Baby Smith raise themselves above though: Aidan Keith Lowe’s drumming is nimble and expressive throughout, adding a welcome cowbell just beneath the surface on “Adored”, woodblocks to the island oasis feel on “Don’t Look Down”, and the soft, crunchy repeated clatter on “Have I Lost Myself Or Sense Of Melody” makes it one of the most memorable moments on the album; flutes from Lisa Baeyens and Doug Cave add welcome woozy textures to “Limoncello River”, help fill the corners on “Golden”, and are a soothing compliment to the somnolent synths on the brief closing lullaby “Goodnight Baby”; and the soft brass from Philipp Uta on “Walkie Talkie” adds a gentleness to the song’s bridge.
As an opening album into their world though, Lately, Love Is Dead is still plenty appealing. Its brevity makes repeated listening an easy task, and it’s perhaps best enjoyed just a little out of view: let it colour the air of a room that a sunrise is lighting. It offers moments to engage and lock in, choruses to take out into the day with you, and a woolly sort of heartache that might expose a gentle layer of sadness, but will stop shy of eliciting a tear. As per the cover art, it wears its heart (or hearts, I guess) on its cheeks instead of its sleeve. Sonder and Gable ask you to look into their glistening, starry eyes. Thankfully there’s enough here to get enamoured by if you stare back.
