For a song that features the word “impatiently” a handful of times, impatience is hardly what comes to mind when listening to Real Estate’s new single ‘Darling’—the first of their upcoming fourth album “In Mind’, out this March.
Bearing an inherent sense of melancholy, ‘Darling’ is a bittersweet dream pop ode to one’s loved one – with a dash of romantic mystique and that endearingly unhurried mood one would expect from the New Jersey indie rockers. “The birds singing/The sun rising/Impatiently/As I wait for you”, lead singer Martin Courtney gently reveals to the object of his affection over a cascading guitar riff and glimmering keys.
The irony between the rhythm’s laid-back, sunny vibe and the narrator’s contained frustration is passed on with a chuckle to the accompanying video, where five seemingly apathetic musicians jam next to a horse begging for attention, giving the cymbals a lick and sniffing around in the studio, rather impatient to break out of this world of mad nonchalance. “The sun cuts like a knife to shine”, sings Courtney, awakening listeners to an aching truth.
‘Darling’ sounds like spring but is rooted in winter—a good metaphor for our current state of affairs, listening to these mellow, sweet melodies, waiting for that new spring album, “for the warm sun to return…”. Well, when Real Estate do impatience, apparently they do it quite well.
