Rumor has it that Beat Radio has been keeping the indie rock dream alive since 2005. No argument here. The medium-fi folk rocker returns after a long layoff with the full-length Real Love. It’s an introspective album that uses jangly hooks and intimate lyrics to reel the listener into frontman Brian Sendrowitz’s meditative mindset, full of regret, joy, and the unnameable.

Longtime listeners of Beat Radio will recognize all the familiar hallmarks of Sendrowitz’s style in the new album.

The lyrics that ride the fence between literary allusion and stream-of-consciousness. The cloying nostalgia of themes, the excessive sweetness of which is expertly cut with a delivery earnest enough to short circuit any cynical takes. The love of rock n roll textures anchored to a certain era located somewhere from the mid-80s to early aughts. 

What may surprise the same set of longtime listeners is the production quality of the new record. Real Love is likely the most crisply recorded album in the Beat Radio discography.

Sendrowitz has made no bones about his affinity with the lo-fi, DIY aesthetic. Over the years his sound has displayed a charming scruffiness, a punk loveliness, like your favorite dog-eared paperback. In the latest album he’s found a way to elevate the aesthetic from lo-fi to medium-fi, holding onto the DIY-flavor while pulling all the separate tracks into greater focus. Title track “Real Love” shows off the improved production as well as any track on the album.

Lead track “Protection Spells” provides a hook-forward entry point to the album. There’s a Pretenders-like texture in the guitar tone and tempo to the song that really satisfies. Shades of War on Drugs. Sendrowitz’s unconventional vocals are also on display from the get go. His vocal style has always been a take-it-or-leave-it affair for listeners. The best comparison might be Daniel Johnston-lite. The pitch is sometimes flat or sharp, and the phrasing can take awkward and unexpected turns. But listen to the album through to the finish, then ask yourself if you could imagine any other voice singing those songs. If you can’t, then it’s the right voice.

Real Love may be the most ambitious Beat Radio album to date in terms of instrumentation. It’s not a long list of instruments – this isn’t Mahler’s 9th.

But the strategic deployment of the saxophone on “Radioactive,” fiddle on “Real Love,” and the banjo here and there throughout the ten tracks, gives the soundscape twists and turns new to the Beat Radio lexicon.

Closing track “We Rise From Fire” suggests a phoenix-like rebirth is in the making. This is standard midlife emo fodder, which doesn’t make it any less poignant or true.

What matters for the music, though, is that the renaissance has dug its claws into Sendrowitz’s songwriting and Beat Radio’s production. Real Love is the best sounding album that Beat Radio has recorded in years, and worth the wait. With nearly two decades of music making under their belt, Sendrowitz and company should be feeling some measure of accomplishment. It’s not quite time to sit on the porch whittling corn cob pipes, but they might consider changing the old slogan from ‘dream’ to ‘reality.’

Beat Radio: keeping the indie rock reality alive since 2005.