A Billion Little Lights
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| A Billion Little Lights | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | February 19, 2021 | |||
| Length | 41:19 | |||
| Label | Royal Mountain | |||
| Producer | David Greenbaum | |||
| Wild Pink chronology | ||||
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| Singles from A Billion Little Lights | ||||
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| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AnyDecentMusic? | 6.6/10[1] |
| Metacritic | 71/100[2] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Beats Per Minute | 82%[3] |
| Exclaim! | 7/10[4] |
| The Line of Best Fit | 6/10[5] |
| Loud and Quiet | 7/10[6] |
| MusicOMH |   [7] |
| Pitchfork | 7.6/10[8] |
A Billion Little Lights is the third studio album by American indie rock band Wild Pink. It was released on February 19, 2021 under Royal Mountain Records.[9]
On October 7, 2020, Wild Pink announced the release of their third studio album, along with the first single "The Shining But Tropical".[9] In a press release, the band's lead vocalist John Ross explained the single: "It was inspired by Carl Sagan’s Cosmos as well as "If I Needed You" by Townes Van Zandt, this song is named for a grim retirement home in Florida. It’s about somebody who was born sheltered realising how large the world is and how unimportant they are."[10]
The second single "You Can Have It Back" was released on November 20, 2020, which also features Ratboys' lead vocalist Julia Steiner.[11] Ross noted the single was the last song written for the album, explaining the single was inspired by Fleetwood Mac.[12]
The third single "Oversharers Anonymous" was released on January 14, 2021.[13] Of the single, John Ross said: "This is one of the first songs I wrote for A Billion Little Lights and was inspired, among many things, by Ken Burns’ The West and the book The Earth Is Weeping by Peter Cozzens. Also inspired by a drive on the Taconic Parkway. Recording everyone’s parts on the outro was one of my favorite parts of making this album."[14]
On February 16, 2021, Wild Pink released the fourth single "Pacific City".[15]
Critical reception
A Billion Little Lights was met with "generally favorable" reviews from critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, this release received an average score of 71 based on 8 reviews.[2] Aggregator AnyDecentMusic? gave the release 6.6 out of 10 based on a critical consensus of 7 reviews.[1]
Writing for Beats Per Minute, John Amen wrote "Brimful of elegant melodies and John Ross’s euphonic vocals, the album’s 10 tracks also feature riveting instrumental undergirds – alternately minimal and lush, succinct and sprawling, earthy and psychedelic. Wild Pink’s third full length sees them at their most fluent, achieving a compositional and performative apex."[3] Chris Gee of Exclaim! wrote "While A Billion Little Lights as a whole is not as elegantly cohesive as Wild Pink's past work, the starry-eyed melodies shine stronger and more confidently than ever. The band's dreamy sentimental detailing and lustrous guitar work is as easily digestible as it is thought-provoking as the layers peel back into both nothing and everything at once."[4]