With standout tracks like “Break,” “Underwater,” and previously released singles “Lying to You,” “Retrograde,” and “Silhouette” (a Blank & Jones remix, which we’re happy to premiere exclusively below), West of the West is a radio-ready electronic-dance album driven by hope of things to come, not overt happiness in the present. There’s a poignant realism to his lyrics they resonate with anyone who has felt the pangs of love, desire, and the distance between. And Goldroom strikes this balance by creating something undeniably modern that still harkens back to simpler times. When done right, an artist can invoke nostalgia without losing their purpose or their integrity see Netflix’s Stranger Things for proof. The symbiotic relationship between his music and the water was seen in his first musical project, NightWaves, and continues to this day. Around this time, his “musical awakening” came about via his first guitar, his first four-track tape recorder, and Nirvana’s Nevermind. He grew up sailing on the water, and taught boating lessons as a teen. Though he did not move to California until attending the University of Southern California, where he studied psychology and public health, he’s had a love affair with the ocean’s twisting tides since he was a boy living in Massachusetts along the Atlantic shoreline. Pulling his debut’s title from a 1903 Theodore Roosevelt address in Ventura, California-“When I come here to California, I am not in the West: I am west of the West”-Legg himself has always pined for the Pacific. It is the perfect September soundtrack for those clinging to the final scraps of summertime. Brimming with sun-kissed flavors and sonic Southern California iconography, West of the West hinges on spring-break nostalgia for glistening bronze skin, sand snug between the toes, and young love and lust. After three EPs (including 2015’s breakout It’s Like You Never Went Away) and an array of viral remixes and memorable music videos, his much-anticipated debut full-length album drops this Friday, September 23. The artist born Josh Legg has been releasing music under the pseudonym Goldroom since 2011. Goldroom’s road to West of the West doesn’t exactly fit the old “overnight success” adage, which is all for the better-he prefers his bright, electronic melodies drenched in sunlight.
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