LANY - Malibu Nights [Clear]

LANY turned a broken heart into nine shimmering pop songs on Malibu Nights, their second album, which glows here on clear vinyl.

Released in 2018 through Side Street and Polydor, the trio's record was written and recorded in early 2018 in the wake of a breakup, with frontman Paul Klein pouring the fallout into song as a kind of therapy. He later said he realised after roughly fifty days that he had written a whole record. Originally due to be called January, it was renamed to feel more universal, and it was produced by the band with Mike Crossey, with more guitar, piano and drums than their synth-heavy debut.

Lead single "Thru These Tears" sets the tone, a slow, aching search for hope inside sorrow. "Thick and Thin" opens the album with a sweeping, big-hearted chorus, and "I Don't Wanna Love You Anymore" captures the dizzy, sleepless disbelief of being left without warning. The title track closes things around a simple, haunting piano figure, the sound of someone finally letting the night sink in.

Honest to a fault and impossibly catchy, it is the album where LANY's pop instincts and emotional candour came into perfect focus. The clear pressing suits its sunset-hued melancholy, and it still feels like a late-night drive along the coast.