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Music

Hear a Slice of Retro-Pop Perfection from Empty Houses’ Debut Album, ‘Daydream’

The former members of Fireworks have a new Motown-inspired project and it will make you feel all kinds of good.

Photo: Rina Movsisyan

Last year, Adam Mercer and David Mackinder, two members of the band Fireworks, announced that they were working on a new project called Empty Houses. But Empty Houses wasn’t what you’d expect from two guys who’d spent the last few years kicking around in a rock band. With a five-song teaser EP, which disappeared from the internet shortly after, they proved they had something different up their sleeves.

Singer Ali Shea is what makes everything work. Her classic vocal style lifts Empty Houses into a sound that could’ve easily fit in with the Motown acts of the 60s, which is appropriate given that the band is rooted in Detroit. The trio has been working on an album over the last year for Sargent House called Daydream. It is ten tracks of retro-pop goodness and they are finally almost ready to unveil it.

You can listen to a track from the album, “Falling Away,” below. Mercer says the song “deals with the realization that what you’re looking for may not actually be what you want. Life can move so fast that you feel like giving up on what’s idealistic for something more realistic.” True, but if what you’re looking for in life is a song to brighten your shit day, “Falling Away” delivers.

Daydream is out June 10.