Vance Joy’s New Album Melts Hearts

Ah, romance. With romance comes spring. And with spring comes the flutter of birds, picnics, Peeps marshmallow bunnies, and a new Vance Joy album. To refresh your memory: Joy released “Riptide,” in 2014 (remember everyone’s Facebook status for like, two years were “I was scared of dentists and the dark?’)

Flash forward, Joy just released his new album, Nation of Two, which Apple describes as “a fairy tale so sweet it belongs in a Hallmark card.” However, I would rather describe it as “the most hipster Instagram photographer and their model boyfriend, on the beach, with a puppy, latte, and collection of succulents.”

Now, don’t get me wrong. The Australian singer-song writer is lyrically talented. His album opens up with “Call Me if You Need Me,” singing, “I love you in the morning when the blood runs to your cheeks / Babe, you are the first thing and the last thing that I’d see / I was just a boy striking matches upon your heart /I couldn’t get no sparks / I loved you in the darkness / I love you in fluorescent light” (which, personally, I wouldn’t mind being sung to me at brunch.) He switches between sweet ballads, such as “Lay It On Me,” and a more bouncy, ukulele-filled hit “Saturday Sun,” which resembles Mumford and Sons. Track 7, “Alone With Me” can melt any icy heart as Joy croons “Everything’s good / Everything’s just as it should be / When you’re alone with me.”

Joy’s first album, Dream Your Life Away, seemed like a page out of a teary diary as he explored who he was, what people want out of him, and if he could ever be good enough (listen to “We All Die Trying To Get It Right” and “Best That I Can”). However, Nation of Two is more positive, and light, as if he pushed through those doors of self-doubt and into a relationship where he feels as if the only two people in the world are him and whoever he loves. In this generation, especially, more and more people are longing to be loved and to love. Listening to Nation of Two, although not entirely realistic, is the perfect album for the hopeless romantic.