Album Review: Courtney Barnett & Kurt Vile - Lotta Sea Lice

Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile for new album Lotta Sea Lice

This hazy yawn of an album sounds like the accomplished work of a seasoned duo, not the first collaboration between two superstar indie singer-songwriters.

The record's far too low key to suggest they bring out the best in each other, but the coming together of Australian Grammy nominee Courtney Barnett and prolific lo-fi rocker Kurt Vile really does seem like a pairing formed in slacker heaven.

Over the album's nine songs the pair's guitar playing locks in effortlessly, their distinctive voices - hers lazy and deadpan, his lazy and drawling - complement each other perfectly.
Although the overall tone is lax, the pair do push themselves, regularly incorporating surprisingly oddball notes, melodies and vocal lines.

The opening track Over Everything, a jaunty slice of easygoing alt-pop, is a great example, as the duo's voices crack and break over a tumbling melody that sees them occasionally jumping over the top of each other.

It's a lo-fi alt-rock gem that sets the tone for the album. Another favourite is Continental Breakfast, which has Vile in full J Mascis mode, as the pair relate food to a long-distance friendship over a laconic feel-good strum.

It's not the only food-based song, the countrified harmonica-filled, yee-ha, whistling ditty Blue Cheese, calls to mind the novelty of fellow lo-fi duo Ween.

The Barnett-led Fear is Like a Forest ramps the energy up, slightly, building up to a cutting guitar solo and a catchy do-do-doo refrain, before Vile's rambling alt-country Outta the Woodwork - a cover of Barnett's Out of the Woodwork - slows things back down.

Barnett also takes on a Vile hit, reimagining his Peeping Tom as a solo acoustic number. It's terrific, but it's the hypnotically droning stoner groove of On Script that proves to be the album's highlight.

The record has an endearingly loose vibe to it, sounding very much like two pals having an easy jam on the porch. It's not a party-starter by any stretch, but it's easy to see Lotta Sea Lice becoming the soundtrack for both, casual afternoon drinks in the sun and the following dusty morning.

Artist: Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile
Album: Lotta Sea Lice
Label: Milk!/Matador
Verdict: