Album: Angus and Julia Stone

It's no secret that I love everything about Angus and Julia Stone. I love their gentle lullaby-like tunes, totally cute album art, always quirky videos, Sydney northern beaches vibe and of course Angus' side stuff as Lady of the Sunshine.
And to that pretty substantial list I can now add the duo's sophmore album Down The Way, which sees an Australian release in just 3 days. Each track is very different from the next. Maybe because it was recorded all around the world: Brooklyn, Coolangatta, Cornwall, London and Queens. Or maybe it's because they don’t write their music together. It's really just an Angus song with support from Julia and vice versa. I reckon this only works because they're siblings and thus are intuned with each other enough to bounce off the others creativity and prevent the album from splitting in half.
Off the back of Angus' solo stuff, the amp has definitely remained plugged in. This is most noticeable on the epic seven-and-a-half-minuter Yellow Brick Road which features a nice little guitar solo as Angus reminisces about getting high in California. This transition from acoustic to rockier occurs more subtly on the second single to come off the album Black Crowe. This is probably my favourite track as it has the heavier guitar sound, but this still plays second fiddle to the soft Stone vocals. But for fans of the bands more melancholic without being depressing sorta sound, there is still plenty of simple acoustic folk. It is here, in tracks such as Walk It Off and I'm Not Yours, which highlight the magic that comes from the simple combination of Angus' rustic surfer voice and the kookier vibe from Julia's vocals.

Angus and Julia Stone-Black Crowe (mp3)