The Electro Pop quartet TEEN has been busy since forming in Brooklyn in 2010. Following two EPs and a pair of full-length albums (2012’s In Limbo and 2014’s The Way and Color), the band’s latest LP, Love Yes, is set to drop this Friday (listen here). TEEN — which consists of sisters Kristina, Katherine and Lizzie Lieberson and Boshra AlSaadi — again rides a wave of frisky beats, buoyant synths and girl-group vocals on Love Yes, but there’s also a darker, more searching element that wasn’t as apparent on previous efforts.
“I think with every record we’ve grown as a band, as musicians, as people, but this time feels different,” Lizzie said in a recent interview with Rookie. “We’re more confident and clear about who we are as a band, and I think that comes across in the music.”
The first single, “Please,” is an attempt by Lizzie, the band’s main songwriter, to understand her relationship with her late father. Backed by languid, atmospheric sonics, the song finds the ladies’ plaintive, interweaving vocals relaying the phrase, “Please talk to me,” before succumbing to a curiously vocal-less final third that can’t help but seem like a poignant goodbye to their father.
That’s not to say Love Yes is a downer — the very next song, “Noise Shift,” is a jumpy, joyous romp that brings to mind the keyboard-driven efforts of Pop masters Imperial Teen. Likewise, album opener “Tokyo” comes off like Blondie high on Pixy Stix, and “Gone for Good” could be mistaken for a long lost ’80s Pop radio hit — or the latest from Haim, a group to which TEEN has more than a passing resemblance.
Find more info on TEEN's free show here.
