7 (Beach House album)

In 2015, Beach House released their fifth studio album Depression Cherry, which marked the band's return to simpler arrangements and minimalist production. The album debuted at number eight on the US Billboard 200, selling 27,000 copies in its first week, becoming their second top-10 entry on the chart. On October 7, 2015, about two months after its release, they announced their sixth studio album Thank Your Lucky Stars, which was stated to be a follow-up, but not a companion, to Depression Cherry or a "surprise or B-sides". In January 2017, the band announced that they were preparing a compilation album consisting of B-sides and rare tracks. This idea came when the band had realized the amount of non-album songs that were made over the years of their career, and how hard it was to find and hear many of them. The compilation album, which was titled B-Sides and Rarities and was released on June 30, 2017, allowed them to "clean out the closet" to pave the way for a new creative process. While touring throughout 2017, guitarist Alex Scally stated that they were steadily developing new material. ==Recording and production==

(pictured in 2013) as a co-producer. For 7, the band wanted to reassess their old methods, where they often limited their writing to structures and arrangements that they were able to perform live, and eventually decided to follow what came naturally, adding that they let their creative spirits, instead of instrumentation, to determine the album's feeling. After working with each other on four studio albums, the duo dismissed producer Chris Coady and insisted that they could handle the work themselves. To record the album, they had several mini-sessions at the duo's home recording studio in Baltimore, Apple Orchard Studios, which was now reworked and expanded from its status of being a practice space. Their recording sessions at their home studio produced only five songs. To speed up this process, the duo hired Peter Kember (Sonic Boom) to help produce the album. James Barone, who has been the duo's touring drummer since 2016, contributed to the album with live drums, with Alan Moulder mixing the entire album. They also recorded the album at Carriage House in Stamford, Connecticut. ==Music and themes==

7 has been primarily described as a dream pop album, Legrand described the album's sound as a natural progression and a product of her maturing as an artist, saying, "There were a lot of new and different things that went into making this record. But I think that the way that we wrote, and how we recorded while we wrote, really increased the speed of capturing ideas and gave us a lot more freedom than previous records... I think every time you do something, you become more adept at it. You sort of know better and don't get fooled the same way you got fooled when you were younger." ==Release and promotion==

in October 2018. On February 15, 2018, after a half-year break following the release of B-Sides and Rarities (2017), the band released a new song, "Lemon Glow", and announced it as the lead single from their then-untitled seventh album, which they said would be released during the spring that year. A "groovy checkered" visualizer was released to accompany the single on the same day. On March 7, 2018, the band officially announced the release of their seventh album, which would be titled 7, unveiling its album cover, track list and an accompanying world tour in addition; the tour would begin on April 30 in Chattanooga, Tennessee and conclude on October 20, 2018, in Dublin. They released "Dark Spring" as the album's third single on April 2, of the same year, alongside a music video directed by Zia Anger. On April 27, 2018, two weeks prior to the release of the album, an exclusive stream of 7 was accessible, via Sub Pop's website, to Sub Pop customers who pre-ordered the album. 7 was officially released on CD, vinyl, cassette, digital download and streaming services on May 11, 2018, through Sub Pop worldwide, Bella Union in Europe and Mistletone in Australia/New Zealand, respectively. Days after the album's release, Beach House performed a live in-studio session on KCRW in Los Angeles on May 15. They also performed "Drunk in LA" as musical guests on Jimmy Kimmel Live! the following day. An accompanying music video for "Black Car" was directed by Legrand's brother, Alistair Legrand, and was released on June 18. A music video for "Drunk in LA", which was directed by Peter Kember, co-producer of 7, was released on September 11, 2018, with a Sonic Boom remix of "Black Car" being released on the same day. On October 23, 2018, the band released a limited edition 7-inch vinyl of "Lose Your Smile", containing a new track from the recording sessions of 7 titled "Alien" as its B-side. It was sold during the band's European tour, in dates from September to October. In addition, a visualizer for "Alien" was uploaded on the same day, which was directed by Charoenchai, and was also released as a standalone single to digital download and streaming services. On the same day, they announced later Australian tour dates, which included shows between February and March 2019. Title and aesthetic The album's title, 7, itself simply represents it being the duo's seventh studio album, saying they "hoped its simplicity would encourage people to look inside. No title using words that we could find felt like an appropriate summation of the album," although they later mentioned that the number 7 represents some interesting connections in numerology, which further inspired them in naming the album as such. The album cover features a collage of torn-apart photographs of landscapes, buildings and crowds of people, as well as pieces of women's faces. Scally stated that album cover features photographs in the public domain, formed into a collage by Post Typography. ==Critical reception==

At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, 7 received an average score of 80, based on 29 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Writing for Stereogum, Gabriela Tully Claymore called 7 the duo's "boldest album yet". Eugenie Johnson of The Skinny wrote, "While they may not have completely achieved seventh heaven here, 7 is still a solid first step heralding Beach House's next phase." Rolling Stones Simon Vozick-Levinson called 7 "a radical blast of psychedelic pop bliss," saying "These are big songs, full of wonder, and Beach House know it. Seven albums in, they're at the start of something new." Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly said "7s artful wooziness is hardly new, but for Beach House, it feels like home." Kelsey J. Waite of The A.V. Club wrote, "With 7, Legrand and Scally have gotten freer themselves. This is the sound of a band that knows itself extremely well and yet, in seeking outside perspectives and embracing imperfection, has discovered a whole new level to explore. If this album feels like an alternate-reality Beach House, it's because Legrand and Scally have altered their reality." Clash lauded the record, writing: "The Baltimore duo have somehow gifted us their masterpiece, and though the rain outside has now stopped, new heavens have opened." Joe Goggins of Drowned in Sound said that 7 is "a record that gets closer to the band's self-imposed boundaries than they ever have before without really threatening to break them down." Flood Magazines Alex Swhear praised the record's "expansive, almost oceanic aura." ==Track listing==

Credits adapted from the liner notes of 7. • Beach House – arrangement, performance; production, engineering • Victoria Legrand • Alex Scally • James Barone – live drums ; engineering • Sonic Boom – accordion , drill ; production • Mikhail Pivovarov – engineering • David Tolemei – engineering, additional editing and recording • Jason Quever – engineering • Alan Moulder – mixing • Caesar Edmunds – engineering • Greg Calbi – mastering • Post Typography – album art, design ==Charts==