A little break from the gloom of winter and late guitar heroes, courtesy of Montreal trio afternoon bike ride. Built on simple beats, gentle guitars, and sumptuous vocals, they’re an aural daydream made for lying in the grass with headphones on, staring at the clouds.

Their second album glossover, follow-up to 2021’s self-titled debut, is due out next week and a just-announced short tour is the perfect balm for someone whose almost-entire year’s show schedule was cancelled over the past little while. The record is effusively but accurately described as:

Genreless and yet familiar, it is an album simultaneously beside a campfire and within a cafe. It’s with you on a long car ride and it’s with you while helping a loved one or checking in on a friend. Bliss and loss and love and grief breathing as one. There’s a “found footage” aspect, with quiet backup vocals and fluttering harmonies that sound like angels flying away. There are outtakes that feel like we’re behind-the-scenes. Cozy and sincere. Talking while cooking, daydreaming in a sunswept daze.

afternoon bike ride @ Friends Of Friends

“Summertime” is one of a handful of available preview tracks, along with a suitably abstract video of, well, nature. I’m ready.