Album Review – Half Life by Castlebeat (2022) (Spirit Goth)
Josh Hwang (aka Castlebeat), somehow manages to find the missing link between all manner of retro yesteryear and the best trends of musical modernity. The fact that the unifying core tends to be the coolest of a bedroom-pop cadence and a veritable lust for a tune, just makes him stand out even further. Certainly, over the course of four albums, he has become something of the flagship act for the brilliant Spirit Goth Records label.
Never far from jangled riffs that stun with a sense of apposite lucidity, tracks such as We Can Make This Right and Looking For Something reduce his signature washed out dream-pop and offer crisp, almost Marr-esque renditions of guitarmanship, augmented by the feeling that the riffs flow from a starting position of laconic ease, rather The Smiths trademark agitation.
Of course this album would simply be void of Hwang / Castlebeat-isms without the constant presence of jangly dream-pop and retro synths. As such Cinema, Into and Become offer his trademark dreamy riffs with a beauty that typically startles, such is the apparent sense of cushioned ease in which the melodies flow, whereas All The Time is simply the best 80s synth-pop track that the decade forgot to write all those years ago.
In a world of great jangly dream-pop acts like Swiss Portrait, Community Swimming Pool, The Churchill Garden, Foliage etc, Castlebeat still retains that indefinable cutting edge.
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