Arlo Parks – Collapsed in Sunbeams

You’re not alone / Like you think you are / We all have scars / I know it’s hard.

In the chorus of Hope, song 4 from her debut album, Collapsed in Sunbeams, 20-year-old British singer-songwriter Arlo Parks repeats this simple message of, well, hope. This song, and the forty-minute album of which it is a standout track, feels like a warm breeze in the middle of a frigid winter.

Throughout the album, Parks’ lounge-ready voice rests atop reverb-drenched chords stabs and arpeggios played on guitars and pianos backboned by beats inspired by boom-bap. This simple formula is reflective of process of recording the album, which involved Parks and Gianluca Buccellati, co-writer and producer of the album, Airbnb-hopping and recording in comfortable neutral-toned bedrooms. This approach of eschewing big-studio recording for home recording gives the album an intimate bedroom pop aesthetic, something that totally works for its musical and lyrical approach. It feels like an afternoon spent lounging with Parks and Buccelatti as they tinker around with a DAW, drum loops, a MIDI keyboard, and an acoustic guitar, as their friends (like Clairo on Green Eyes) stream in and out, jamming with them. 

Even with her vocal delivery, Parks leans into this vibe, as if she’s holding a tattered diary, singing out lines from it. The verses are little bits of flash fiction that draw from her life – sung comfortably: mid-tempo, mid-pitch, entirely at ease. It makes you nostalgic for memories you know you never had. Like in the aforementioned Hope, and the album’s other standouts, Hurt, Caroline, and Eugene, the choruses serve as a focal point to showcase the ‘moral of the story’ for each song, if you will. It’s a simple, but super-effective approach to songwriting (and storytelling).

In many ways, Collapsed in Sunbeams reminds me of three very interesting albums from last year – Moses Sumney’s græ, Lianne La Havas’ self-titled album, and Amaarae’s The Angel You Don’t Know – of which two made it to Stranger Fiction’s list of best albums of 2020. Like those albums, it’s a confident pop record. But what stands out most for me is what a perfect accompaniment it is to this particularly cold and long winter.