Album Review: Sunbeam Sound Machine - Wonderer

It’s on a brilliant ray of sunshine that Melbourne’s Nick Sowersby delivers his debut Sunbeam Sound Machine album.

Wonderer features a lo-fi psychedelic pop sound that’s spaced out and lost in a blurry haze of wobbling jelly tones that blows out of the speakers like a surreal daydream. As you ease yourself into these gentle, immersive soundscapes, intricate layers of melodies, vocals and simply strange sounds vie for your attention but it’s kind of impossible to focus on anything for too long. As you drift across these sounds they conjure images in the mind’s eye of magical places filled with rainbows and unicorns.

The light, fluffy tone of this album creates ambiances that will leave listeners feeling as though they’re floating through a kaleidoscopic explosion of time and space. While Daibutsu and Infinity +1 deliver upbeat feel-good moments, the darkly glittering Fever Dream and Somehow slide into more hallucinatory textures. Real Life celebrates a world of infinite possibilities while A Brief Attempt At Explaining The Sky looks at the word with wide-eyed wonderment and innocence. Autumnal dispenses sage advice by asking us to wind down the existential angst and simply experience the delight of everything around us.

The charm of this record lies in the fact that it’s like a soft doona stuffed with feathers that you can just pull over your head, cocoon yourself from mundane realities and for a little while lose yourself in daydream; an utterly charming record that demands repeat listening.