Kevin Bronson on February 25th, 2021

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L.A. trio Tashaki Miyaki have dialed back the Wall of Sound for their forthcoming album “Castaway,” but a beautiful veneer remains.

The album’s languorous title track makes melancholy sound inevitable … which, come to think of it: “The title of the record comes from this thing a friend would say. He called himself a ‘castaway from decent society.’ I feel like a castaway from everything a lot of the time,” says singer-drummer Paige Stark. “When I wrote the title track, I was thinking about love and how it changes over time if you stay in something long enough. It gets hard. And sometimes you feel stuck, and that’s kind of the mood of the record. Being stuck with yourself or with your partner or with your habits or thoughts. Being stuck in your reality, in your life.

“It’s a pretty melancholy record, I guess. I always try to be direct, but I didn’t have as much life lived on the first record. I saw things very black and white, and perhaps simpler. Now I see a lot more grey and a lot more complexity. And I think this record goes into that grey area.”

Stark directed the quietly devastating video, which was inspired by the work of Sophia Coppola and stars Camila Doring.

“For the video I wanted to tap into all the feelings that can come up in love relationships: anger, sadness, loneliness, vulnerability, stillness, joy, romance, longing,” Stark says. “Cami, my actress, has a beautifully expressive face and I’ve known her for a long time. I knew we would be able to create those moments together. I wanted it to feel like the camera was her lover, capturing her in various private moments, moods and feelings.

“‘Castaway’ is about the challenges of romantic love and how we are all bad at it in one way or another,” she adds. “The idea of a castaway in all this is that no one understands the relationship except the people in it, so you really are stuck on an island alone together there, and maybe you make it back to the mainland, and maybe you stay on the island.”

“Castaway” the album, the second full-length from the trio of Stark, Luke Paquin and Sandi Denton and the follow-up to 2017’s “The Dream,” is out April 23. Since the band got its start almost a decade ago, they have also been prolific at doing covers — see their Bandcamp.

||| Watch: The video for “Castaway”

||| Previously: “Gone,” “Girl on T.V.,” “Cool Runnings,” “Best Friend,” “Somethin’ Is Better Than Nothin’”