Released in 2001, Beulah's's The Coast is Never Clear is a testament to sunny, beach friendly indie pop. Miles Kurosky and Co. created an album that explored an interesting, Brian Wilson-esque juxtaposition: warm, friendly harmonies and bright, sunny arrangements fused with meloncholy lyrics and hushed nostalgia for golden summer sunsets and sheets covered in sand. Lyrically the record documents the lonely, yet surprisingly hopeful, period Miles went through after a breaking up with a girlfriend.
But Beulah's references are much more than Surfer Girl refrains and Wilson family la-la's: in "Popular Mechanics for Lovers," Kurosky sings "I heard he wrote you a song/but so what/ some guy wrote 69/ and one just ain't enough," a shout out to Stephen Merritt of the Magnetic Fields who released their album 69 Love Songs, (containing 69 love songs of course) a few years earlier. Likewise, "A Good Man is Easy To Kill" is a variation on Flannery O'Connor's short story "A Good Man Is Hard to Find". Musically The Coast is Never Clear sounds, smells and feels like a California sunset; "Woodie" station wagon, six pack of PBR, sunscreen, wet trunks, silhouettes on the shore, all through Blue Blockers' tangerine hue. A perfect record for early mornings when you can't sleep, mellow afternoons by the pool and other lackadaisical summer activities. Download a few tracks below and peep the video for "Gene Autry"
Beulah- What Will You Do When Your Suntan Fades?
Beulah- Popular Mechanics for Lovers
"When I Get to California I'm Gonna Write My Name in the Sand"
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