The Milk Carton Kids Deliver More Stripped Down Impeccable Harmonies On ‘I Only See The Moon’ (ALBUM REVIEW)

Photo credit: Brendan Pattengale

Joey Ryan and Kenneth Pattengale are back with The Milk Carton Kids seventh studio album, and first since 2019’s The Only Ones, titled I Only See The Moon. Self-produced and stripped down, the eleven-song effort eases out majestically around the duo’s vocal harmonies and light acoustic instrumentation.  

The Southern California-based, modern-day version of Simon and Garfunkel, took more time with this album than any of their past efforts. The band had a newly found recommitment to their craft right before the pandemic shut down the world, so they took their time to get the album right. These songs touch on solitude, fading love, trying to grow up and some bleak topics, but their sweet sound together makes listening to them a joy. 

Opening with “All of the Time in the World To Kill” the duo lyrically take nothing for granted, and paired with the excellently played “Running On Sweet Smile”, these tracks represent high points of Pattengale and Ryan’s sense of pretty, yet direct, folk songs with gorgeous harmonies and heartfelt lyrics.  

Musically the band adds banjo picking to their sound with both the lightly galloping yearning of “When You’re Gone” and the starkly haunting “One True Love”, which sounds as if it was written centuries ago. The Milk Carton Kids slowly build the tension for “Wheels & Levers” which drips into the title track which, unfortunately, adds overly sentimental strings and a sappy feeling of malaise.

Better is the upbeat (and more importantly fun) bluegrass jaunt “Body & Soul”, but the band’s comfort zone is when they slow down and harmonize beautifully, like on the extended and gracefully swelling, “North Country Ride”. 

I Only See The Moon wraps up with the lightly waltzing “While You Remember Me?” a bittersweet love song that adds an accordion to Pattengale and Ryan’s acoustic guitars and perfectly matching vocals, flowing out easily into a warm spring night.  

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