Premiere: Guards, ‘Beacon’

Kevin Bronson on April 11th, 2019

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Six years and three times zones later, there is a second album on the way from Guards, the indie band founded by Richie James Follin with Loren Humphrey (his bandmate in the Willowz) and Kaylie Church.

“Modern Hymns,” out May 22, is the follow-up to 2013’s “In Guards We Trust,” a collection of hooky indie-rock anthems as addictive as ’90s FM radio, released three years after Guards were launched in New York City. A lot has happened since then. Follin and Church moved back to their native Southern California and welcomed their first child. The Willowz released a comeback album. Follin released a solo album, played in sister Madeline’s band Cults and played in CRX, the side project launched by the Strokes’ Nick Valensi. Humphrey drummed for the Last Shadow Puppets, Florence + the Machine, Arctic Monkeys and Tame Impala.

The new album’s wide range of sonic flourishes and moods owe to its long incubation period; it was actually started long ago on Long Island and finished in L.A., featuring contributions from the likes of Mike Shuman (Queens of the Stone Age), Money Mark (Beastie Boys), Patrick Keeler (Raconteurs, Greenhornes), Benji Lysaght (Father John Misty, Beck), James Richardson (MGMT), Matt Schaeffer (Kendrick Lamar) and Brian Oblivion (Cults).

The hopeful, synth-drenched “Beacon,” the album’s third single, is actually a female empowerment song. “Hey little girl sitting next to me / Never let ’em tell you what you need to be / Never let ’em tell you how to write your book / Never let ’em tell you how you need to look,” Follin urges as the song chugs toward a future when such things might be possible.

“‘Beacon’ is a letter I wrote to my daughter before she was born,” says Follins, adding with a laugh: “She is 3 now and dislikes most songs with reverb so she isn’t into it.

“The message is essentially to not listen to what ‘they’ tell you. You can write your own story. You can direct the movie that is your life. There is no way it is ‘supposed to be.’ Someone just told you that, because someone before them told them that, and they never questioned it. It’s not real. Create your own reality. Question everything. Mistakes are a positive if you let them guide you like a beacon. They can help you examine yourself and what needs to be learned. They are a way toward the truth. They are how you really grow. The truth can’t be extinguished. Real doesn’t fade it just changes.”

||| Stream: “Beacon”