Nada Surf’s latest, Moon Mirror, is not only their first release for Americana-dominated New West Records, but it also marks a new musical step forward for the long-running indie pop band. Despite now sharing a roster with bands like 49 Winchester and John Hiatt, don’t expect an album full of banjos and mandolins, but it does find the band pulling off an impressive exorcism of emotions, delving into some heavy themes touching on loss, grief, doubt, and uncertainty throughout the record.
Lyrically, the band has always boasted a knack for writing smart lyrics with emotional heft, wrapped in expansive instrumentation, but Moon Mirror seems to be one of their most introspective exercises yet. “In Front of Me Now” is a reminder to live in the now and not simply sleepwalk through life, while the title track shares a similar thought about connecting and being in the present (accentuated by beautiful harmonies). “Losing” is probably the starkest example here of the band coming to grips with loneliness and uncertainty, while “Give Me the Sun” finds the band striking a more optimistic tone.
The album closes on “Floater,” a mellow, introspective track that’s strikingly affecting and serves as the exclamation point to all that precedes it. “Every time we make an album, I’m asked (and ask myself) what it’s about. I never know how to answer that question. I’m still trying to figure everything out, and that’s probably as close to a theme as there is,” admits singer/guitarist Matthew Caws. But with even a brief listen to the lyrics, it’s clear growing older, changing priorities, and trying to refocus on living in the moment all take up more significance on this album.
To the Gen X kids who still first remember seeing Nada Surf’s “Popular” almost incessantly in the mid-1990s, the band seems a lifetime away from what could have easily been another career tagged with the one-hit wonder descriptor. But through 10 studio albums and nearly three decades, Nada Surf has evolved into one of the most consistently satisfying indie pop/rock bands out there. Moon Mirror shows that their music is still evolving.
