LuxDeluxe is from Northampton, Mass., but the band doesn’t much sound like the various outfits that have given the town its reputation as an underground hot bed (an aesthetic best exemplified by longtime scene anchors Dinosaur Jr.). The five guys in LuxDeluxe, all in their early 20s, make straightforward Rock & Roll that draws equally from such iconic touchstones as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones as well as modern-day masters Wilco.
The band’s 2011 debut, Hollow Ground, appeared when the guys were still teenagers — word is LuxDeluxe’s members have been playing together since they were 8 years old — and it’s a solid if obvious effort set apart by Ned King’s yearning vocals and Gabe Bernini’s insistent keyboards. The follow-up, 2015’s It’s a Girl, is a leap forward in both production and songwriting chops, opening with “What You Need,” a catchy, textured Pop Rock track centered on King’s repeated lyrical admission, “What you need is more than I got.”
As a sort of present to fans, LuxDeluxe dropped a “visual album EP” called Midnight Snack the day after Christmas. The EP features four songs presented via one unedited take as the camera follows the band members through what seems to be their permanent living quarters (a bedroom that features posters of The Beatles, Stones and Wilco, confirming the aforementioned influences). Midnight Snack is the most interesting thing LuxDeluxe has yet produced — stripped-down, oddball Pop nuggets that could be mistaken for Summerteeth demos — and bodes well for what might come next.
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This article appears in Jan 18-25, 2017.