Khruangbins fourth studio album, A La Sala (To the Room in Spanish), is an exercise in returning in order to go further, and doing so on your own terms. It continues the mystery and sanctity that is the key to how bassist Laura Lee Ochoa, drummer Donald DJ Johnson, Jr. and guitarist Mark Marko Speer approach music. If 2020s Mordechai, the last studio LP Khruangbin made without collaborators, was a party record that enhanced the bands musical reputation far and wide, then A La Sala is the measured morning after. Its a gorgeously airy record completed only in the company of the groups longtime engineer Steve Christensen, with minimal overdubs. Its a window onto the bounties powering Khruangbins vision, a reimagining and refueling for the long haul ahead. A La Sala scales Khruangbin down to scale up, a creative strategy with the future in mind.
The trios collective musical DNA, the years spent constructing it in Houstons local-meets-global cultural stew, ensures the band continues to sound like no one but itself. A cascade of crisp melodies emanates from Markos reverb-heavy electric, dancing gently around Laura Lees minimalist almost-dub bass triangles, while DJs drums serve as the tightened-up pocket and unwavering dance-floor on which all this movement takes place. Yet theres a freshness to A La Salas instrumental interactivity, less concerned with getting further out than going deeper in, a profound desire to celebrate the worlds external wonders. Where prior albums strived towards musics polyglot edges, such inquiries now sound like beloved intimacies. Here, Khruangbins sonic touch-points whether spaghetti-western film scores (on Fifteen Fifty-Three), West African discos (on Pon Pn), G-funk fantasias (Todava Viva), living room dancing moments (the first single, A Love International), or even ambient found-sounds (on Farolim de Felgueiras and throughout the album) are ingrained characteristics. This is who they are! Unique and huge (and growing), ambitious and driven.
Khruangbins aspirations and commitment to playful creativity even extends to A La Salas vinyl packages, of which there will be seven distinctive covers and color-sets. Designed by the band using Markos multitude of travelog photos, the images are windows from the bands living room onto a set of daydreams, scenes of impossible skies, external glances that illuminate what is going on inside. Each cover image comes with a matching color vinyl. These too are all about looking out and looking back, in order to better look ahead.
1. Fifteen Fifty-Three
2. May Ninth
3. Ada Jean
4. Farolim de Felgueiras
5. Pon Pn
6. Todava Viva
7. Juegos y Nubes
8. Hold Me Up (Thank You)
9. Caja de la Sala
10. Three From Two
11. A Love International
12. Les Petits Gris
