Johnstonsons "Hard II Impersonate"

Detroit duo Johnstonsons — John River and Stonny Moon, lifelong friends operating under a band name that reads like a Lynchian fake ID — arrive with their debut full-length "Hard II Impersonate" on à La Carte Records. The name sounds more like a CB handle or a landscaping company than a synth-pop band, which is exactly what lets the actual record sneak up on you: a 28-minute new-wave/synth-pop LP that turns the gap between expectation and execution into part of the pleasure. Three years in the making, two full attempts scrapped along the way, the album is the third pass and the first one only Johnstonsons could plausibly have written.

Sonically the record draws on the cinematic emotional reach of Tears for Fears, the patient spaciousness Talk Talk worked into the seams of their best arrangements, and the contemporary discipline of Body of Light — songs that trust a held note before they sell you anything. Guitars soar without grandstanding, synths breathe, vocal hooks lock in fast and stay. Lyrically Johnstonsons trade the cryptic for something more direct and less defensive — the kind of plainspoken vulnerability that's harder to fake than metaphor. Production duties were shared with Trey Frye of Korine, who also mixed and mastered the LP and is responsible in no small part for how unhurried the record feels even at full sprint.