Best Coast, Crazy for You (Mexican Summer, 2010)

If there ever was a time to judge an album by its cover, it would be now. A bright yellow background with a palm tree, a cat and a beach that resembles a postcard from the ‘60s gives listeners a great preview of what’s to come on the 13 tracks about boys, California and getting stoned.
Best Coast, an indie-pop band from California, released its first full-length album “Crazy for You” in the summer of 2010. Still getting heavy play months later, the album makes for a feel-good listen any time of the year. Singer, songwriter and guitar player Bethany Cosantino croons on tunes that never make it past the three-minute marker as simplistic lyrics mixed with fuzzy unproduced sounds make for an endless lazy summer vibe on standout tracks such as “Crazy for You,” “Each and Everyday” and “Boyfriend.” On “Our Deal,” Cosantino cries, “I wish you would tell me how you really feel/ But you’ll never tell me ‘cuz that’s not our deal” over haunting guitar riffs, simple percussions and echoes of her own voice.
Keeping with their summer vibes, the record sounds like something that could have been made in the ‘60s in the midst of surf-rock— imagine if the Beach Boys and the Dum Dum Girls got together today.

Though the band released several EP’s before, they didn’t prove to be as upbeat, structured or focused as their new full-length release. Their 2009 EP, “Where the Boys Are” didn’t sound promising. The band sounded like another group trying to make an unstructured album for the sake of making noise, as you could barely make out the lyrics Cosantino was signing through the muffled guitar.
Cosantino started singing clear, comprehensive lyrics and she should have done it a while ago, since she has a charming voice. The group also toned down the fuzziness of its sound by adding some uplifting poppy percussion elements to the new album. Around the same time of the album release, the group also added drummer, Ali Koehler of the Vivian Girls, giving the band a more complete sound.
While their new simplistic sound is effective, on several of the tracks the lyrics start to lack creativity and are easily confused with similar lyrics from other songs on the album. With Best Coast’s newly revamped sound and style no listener with ever have to suffer from the winter blues again because “… there’s something about the summer.”