Baby Robot Media

There’s a wistful, unpretentious elegance to Book Club’s sound. At once urbane and downhome, this is modern pastoral pop music that—in sound and spirit—can trace a straight line back to the simple, unaffected roots of American storysong. On Book Club’s new LP, One-Way Moon (out Feb. 3 via Cottage Recording Co./Bear Kids Recordings), frontman/songwriter Robbie Horlick practices introspection without navel-gazing, his wounded warble trickling like creekwater past the strum of the nylon six-string and the pluck of the banjo, cascading over daydreamy piano and the breathy moan of bow on strings. Further downstream, his vocal melodies empty into a crystal pool where they swirl gently, endlessly, around the wholesome, charmingly demure voice of harmony singer Rachel Buckley. The whole affair is a dazzling exercise in restraint—a stripped-bare, acoustic album where what you don’t hear is just as important as what you do.

Glide Magazine is premiering “Most Lonely” from One-Way Moon, a track that affirms Book Club as devoted practitioners of experimental sounds and orchestration.

“”Mostly Lonely” is one of my favorite songs on the record, says Horlick.”The music and lyrics came to me very quickly and naturally, as if I were just channeling them, and the song was arranged and recorded in the studio much the same way. I tend to trust songs that develop in this way more than songs I labor over.”

Horlick goes on to explain, “To me, it’s one of a certain category of songs that sneak up on you. It’s melodic, driving and upbeat, but it hides a darker theme: one of those “happy” songs that, after a few listens, you realize is actually kind of sad. Not that the narrator’s point of view is a secret—the premise is the title—but I think the tune’s melody and arrangement allow the listener to kind of float over it, letting the point marinate (“when the sun is bright, it’s hard to see just how dark it might actually be”) and then surface if and when the listener’s subconscious wants.”

“Whoever the narrator is speaking to—whether himself or someone else—the point is clear, and the question is direct (“Is it that hard to see?”). But what we do with that perspective is the point. We can treat it as an observation, a truth, a distortion or a call to action. It can be a sad song; it can be a happy song. It can be a sad song that makes people happy, or a happy song that makes people sad. Or some other combination. But no matter what, it’s a slice of honest and direct emotion. That was the aim, at least.” LISTEN HERE…