San Francesca’s sophomore LP, We Live In Public, released earlier this year on Side With Us Records, marks a dramatic shift for the band. To put it simply, they added a drummer. That may not sound like much, but in the case of San Francesa it is.
When the band first started it was a weird two-piece band called Le Verita, performing what can be best described as post-rock meets synth-pop, a band unlike any other in the South Bay. With Harrison Russell on guitars/lead vocals and Star Quach on keyboards/drums machines, they were an odd addition to any bill. They wrote ambitious songs, with incomplete arrangements, which was part of their charm.
The addition of Cody Rhodes put an end to that charm, as well as the synth pop element, but that’s not a bad thing. San Francesa have continued to grow steadily as musicians and We Live in Public is their best recording to date.
What has emerged is a heartfelt indie rock album with depth and complex texturing. The songs build slowly with drama and passion. In the wrong hands these songs would be filtered through the lens of irony, but Russell tempers his emotionality and honesty with artistic restraint, yet never obscures his vulnerability.
The opening three tracks, “Monolith,” “Compression” and “Outside” are the darkest tracks on the LP. While aggressive isn’t the right word exactly, they are heavier and grittier than any of San Francesca’s previous efforts. They’ve never toyed with this much dissonance before. They give the songs an extra layer of distance by drenching Russell’s vocals in distortion.
But by the fourth track, “Entitled,” the vocal-distortion is gone and the songs mellow out a bit. They mix gorgeous, momentous keyboards with a rock edge and pop-sensibilities. Track number five, “Statues” is a bitter-sweet ballad that sounds like something from the Le Verita days, albeit a much fuller, thoughtful version. This song, as a three-piece, reveals their interest in slow-burning, post-rock bands like Sigur Rós. It’s the audio equivalent of sun rising in the morning.
The album stays mostly mellow from then out, “Criminal,” while a darker song, is perhaps the most quiet track on the record, with only guitar, vocals and some subtle textures. It leaves the listener with an unsettling feeling.
