The lovely ladies at Julie Tippex bring us yet another great band to kick off summer in Berlin with The Babies, a superband of sorts made up of Vivian Girls leading lady Cassie Ramone and Kevin Morby of Woods along with Justin Sullivan and Brian Schleyer.
After a well received debut album and a period following this interrupted by their various committments to their other bands the second studio album Our House On The Hill came out late last year on Woodsist and received this gushing recommendation from Pitchfork which is just about as good a reason as any to come along and see them:
While the Babies’ first record pushed lines on mortality and social anxiety through a compressed, grainy filter, Hill feels more open and vital. The Babies‘ warm fuzz, captured atWoods’ Rear House Studios, tended to mask the album’s greatest asset– its lyrics. Proper polish from an L.A. studio has cleared that up, and they’ve added an array of instrumental flourishes without straining too hard for maturity. Here, the Babies bend an ear towards Jimmie Rodgers, Everly Brothers, and Lee Hazlewood, along with Southern blues and gospel (“Lord”-summoning abound). Morby can be an expert storyteller as he waxes existential and sings tales of subterranean danger, slippery romance, drunken rebels; he variously offers funny colloquialisms or cutting desolation. We’re left with a dense caricature of American counterculture, in constant movement towards dreams, thrills, or vice.
Here’s Baby and a live session:
