Happy Valentine’s day! Here’s a depressing record. As the newly formed LVLTR announces on God Bless Our Happy Home, “This band/record exists for anyone who feels stuck in a situation they don't want to be in.” Reuniting Pulling Teeth’s Chris Kuhn and Dom Romeo, the project is about failed relationships- failed marriages, failed self-actualization, failed relationships to the world. That is to say, it’s a very personal record.

The band bathes the self-reflection in a huge shoegaze type guitar wash. Bassist Lauren Beecher adds a contrast to Kuhn’s low rumble and sometimes the band gets downright poppy. Second track “Born to die” is powered by a juiced up guitar charge that, with a little twisting, could have fit into Integrity while Romeo was in that band. Drummer Sean Garwood keeps things pushing along so that while the whole record might be about sorrow, it strangely has an invigorating pulse.

The band toys with their core texture through the release- it’s mostly a big buzzy guitar and emotive vocals, but sometimes it’s a charge thrust and sometimes, like on “save it for the papers,” it’s a bluesy, almost Mick taylor-ish wailing. Just like the band examines regret and loss and hopelessness lyrically, they seem to be examining the sonics that conjure the same emotions from every angle. Sadness can get very monotonous, yet a rarified few can take that broad emotion and make it as deep as it is interesting- Joy Division, Neutral Milk Hotel, even the Flaming Lips. LVLTR are taking all the right cues and are showing one emotion is actually many, many different emotions wired together.