The Casket Girls' debut album
Sleepwalking is the result of a collaboration between Ryan Graveface and two vocalists he ran across while walking through the streets of Savannah, Georgia, Elsa and Phaedra. Graveface had already written and recorded a batch of songs and he asked the duo to write lyrics and record vocals for them. Graveface is one of the guys behind
Black Moth Super Rainbow and the music he puts together here fully embraces that band’s approach of super gooey vintage synth textures with an underlying spooky and unsettling vibration. The words and vocal melodies the girls came up with only help reinforce that feeling as they tell tales of ghosts and visiting graves, and generally give off an air of soothing weirdness that’s occasionally touched by a sense of resigned dread. Their unschooled vocals and angelic harmonies make them sound like a haunted
Shangri-Las, which only makes things creepier. There is a palpable melancholy that pervades and invades each song, sneaking in around the edges of the hooky synth melodies and the catchy choruses like a dark mist. Even the songs that have a little bit of bounce to them, like the disco-y “Heartless,” are dark around the edges. It definitely makes
Sleepwalking an uneasy listening experience for the less stout-hearted listeners, especially thanks to the ultra-spooky “The Visitor,” but between the thick, sticky music Graveface concocts and the forbidding charms of the vocals, the record is poppy and sweet enough on the whole that it’s worth setting aside any fears, unlocking the front door, and letting the music in. If you’re a hardy soul with no reservations about scary and unsettling music,
Sleepwalking will satisfy on both those counts. ~ Tim Sendra