Album Review: Pray for Rain by Pure Bathing Culture

Sarah Vesprille and Daniel Hindman, the Portland-based duo who work as Pure Bathing Culture, follow a well-trodden route, combining the sounds of sunshine with lyrics exploring the unutterable fear of existence. So while the opening track, The Tower, feels like something you might hear in a beachfront bar at sunset, the lyrics were inspired by the disappearance of Malaysia Airline flight 370. In truth, you’d have be listening extremely closely to pick up on the the existential dread that apparently permeates the album: Pure Bathing Culture’s sound is so consistent – melodic, but slightly gauzy and blurred around the edges – that one gets caught in the sonics, and the singing becomes just another texture in the recording.

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Moon Tides, the debut album by Pure Bathing Culture (Portland, Oregon duo Sarah Versprille and Daniel Hindman) was one of 2013’s most unfairly under-acknowledged releases, a collection of songs that embedded themselves firmly in your heart whilst overwhelming you with their radiant, celestial pop beauty. Versprille and Hindman had first come together as part of Vetiver (playing on their Tight Knit and Errant Charm albums) and while on the surface this link doesn’t provide any particularly obvious points of reference (their sound is quite distanced from that Andy Cabic has laid down under the Vetiver name) it does provide some context behind Pray For Rain, namely in the confidence that runs through the album. Their decision to pursue their own musical ideas receives further, more tangible vindication on this outing.

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Pure Bathing Culture's debut album was a bewitching, home-cooked take on Cocteau Twins-style dream pop that cast a murky spell. Sarah Versprille's fluttering vocals and Daniel Hindman's warped layers of guitars were mixed to perfection by producer Richard Swift, resulting in a debut that was shockingly good and original. For the follow-up, the duo added members of their live band on drums and bass, and turned to producer John Congleton (who had worked with St.

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The overall atmosphere of Pure Bathing Culture’s sophomore full-length, Pray for Rain, is one of merciless cheeriness — the kind perpetuated by the California drought, bringing sunshine day after day as plants wither and streams run dry. Lead singer Sarah Vesprille’s lyrics bring out the more sinister, heavy undercurrent of the havoc wrought by those golden rays. Throughout Pray for Rain, she and bandmate Daniel Hindman labor over ideas about connection, communication, and staying true to oneself creatively, filtering their own experiences through a wider lens of how hard it can be to figure out a path through early adulthood while attempting to keep all your childhood dreams intact.

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With the follow-up to their 2013 debut album ‘Moon Tides’, Sarah Versprille and Daniel Hindman of Pure Bathing Culture have skilfully negotiated a step away from production trickery and have honed in on the bare bones of songwriting. It therefore seems fitting that the theme of being brave enough to be your true self is one that the duo return to in their lyrics. The Portland couple’s work with producer John Congleton (St.

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How’s your knowledge of twentieth century existential poetry? If you’re anything like me, you’ll know just enough to squeeze through a specialist round at a local pub quiz. But if you’re anything like Pure Bathing Culture, you’d be able to slam dunk some serious knowledge at Paxman during a marathon University Challenge session. Since their formation in 2012, Sarah Versprille and Daniel Hindman have made a habit of producing erudite pop music, and have reaped the benefits of formatting their sound firmly in dream pop realm.

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