REVIEW: Lavendine — Here to You (SINGLE)
You’d never know it from the first thirty seconds of play, but Lavendine’s new single “Here to You” is a harmony hurricane just waiting to wash your speakers in beautiful melodies this fall. Behind a soft acoustic guitar, the drums circle the verses and box in the singers as if to imply an ever-tightening rope around the narrative they’re trying to construct. The poetry is gorgeous but not quite cutting, but just when it feels as though Lavendine are about to be suffocated by the band closing in around them and us the same, they release a tidal wave of catharsis in the chorus immediately returning justice to its place above these beats. “Here to You” is deeply emotional compositionally and made all the more so because of how sincerely these performers present it.
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I can see where a lot of other bands might have gone with a bulkier bassline than what this duo ended up choosing, but to their credit, it does leave the harmony sounding a lot lighter towards the fever pitch of the song. There’s nothing worse than an anticlimactic finish in a track that has the kind of immense tension “Here to You” is born of from the get-go, but it would appear that Lavendine could be teaching a course on how to give us exactly what we need right in the clutch moment we need it in this single. They’ve refined their style a lot over the years, and I think this is the most focused they’ve ever sounded.
As much as I could praise the singing in this single, I’ve got a lot of love for this backing band’s presence as well. They’re uncompromisingly smooth and rehearsed, giving the energy of an orchestra more than they do a country outfit. The pastoral cues have a lot of effect on how we interpret the personal nature of the story Lavendine are telling, and to me, they make the entire song feel a lot more straightforward and steeped in truth than it would have with a different set of players behind these truly gifted vocalists. The little details are what make the difference in this genre, and as a longtime follower, I can say this is a pair that never leaves them to chance.
Anyone who was ready to count Lavendine out of the game in 2021 definitely didn’t see a treasure like “Here to You” coming down the pipes anytime soon — let alone this October — and I have a feeling that this country-style CCM twosome is about to start commanding a lot more respect from around the underground in the months ahead. They aren’t taking the easy road in this piece, but instead challenging each other and their band to go a little further into the arms of a traditional (albeit rock-heavy) country groove, and if there’s anything we can learn about the future of their discography from listening to “Here to You,” it’s that their passion is only going to get stronger with age.
Colin Jordan
