You Fell Into Vacation Zone

Doom “That’s That”

Doom’s mush-mouthed delivery has a way of putting his sharp lyrics in soft focus, but that’s not exactly a big problem when his voice recedes into the warmth of casual, lived-in tracks. For all its grime and grit, Born Like This is a rather cozy album, and that ends up making Doom’s densely constructed lyrics come off as spontaneous and intuitive rather than ostentatious and overly obscure. A lot of the best rappers have a way of making it seem as though they communicate entirely in rhyme, and you kinda get that here with Doom — he’s not exactly conversational in his flow, but his muttered verses sound entirely organic, as though rapping is as much of a comfort zone for him as regular speech. I suppose this is what you’d want from any rapper, but really, just think of how even some of the best emcees can sound very fussy and over-composed.

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Real Estate “Beach Comber”

Real Estate are mellow, low-key in their tunefulness, somewhat lo-fi, and obsessed with nostalgia — in other words, they are very much keyed into the general vibe celebrated by a lot of my Pitchfork peers in 2009. There’s something else going on here, though, but it’s tricky to figure out what it is. The sound is chilly and brittle, the vocals are more outgoing and generous than what you’d expect from “glo-fi” or plain old lo-fi acts. There is no haziness, just brisk percussion, crisp melodic leads, and a voice surrounded by what seems like a mall parking lot’s worth of empty space and open sky. “Beach Comber” is a song that feels as though it’s right on the edge of loneliness, but has a dim awareness that it’s exactly where it wants to be in the moment. It’s got a lovely faded sweetness, and a gentle swing. It might refer to the summer, but it sure sounds like the winter to me.

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