Kevin Bronson on July 14th, 2011

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There’s always been the strong beat of a human heart behind the machines the churn out the indie-pop of Letting Up Despite Great Faults. Even if, as with the Los Angeles quintet’s new “Paper Crush” EP, that heart is broken.

Songwriter Mike Lee’s newest batch of songs was informed by the end of a romance, as he struggled, he says, “to understand that even the greatest things don’t last forever.” He explains: “I spent a lot of time writing it completely alone, and the emotional separation came out in some of the distorted songs. But I try not to get super-emo, you know? The idea is that at the end of the line, there’s always hope.”

||| Stream: “Sophia in Gold”

“Paper Crush” (due Aug. 2 on Old Flame Records) recalls the fuzz-drenched electro of the Pains of Being Pure at Heart and the Radio Dept., and their predecessors, only with a distinctive California shimmer. Like those bands, Letting Up Despite Great Faults is a two-headed beast – a bedroom pop act that takes on another dimension when Lee’s songs are performed live with a five-piece.

“I write for the recording and try not to think how it will sound live,” Lee says. “Which is why people always tell us, ‘You sound so much different live.’ When we perform, it’s almost like we re-interpret the songs. With all that said, though, there will be times I’ll play a guitar part or come up with a drum sequence and think, ‘This will be really fun live.'”

The new “Sophia in Gold” is probably the least personal song on the EP. “It’s actually one of the very few pieces that’s fictional,” Lee says. “It’s about how people on the outside perceive your relationships, and how that affects you, and how it can be super-dramatic.”

||| Live: Letting Up plays Aug. 1 at the Echo on the first night of Active Child’s residency.

||| Previously: “Teenage Tide” and Letting Up’s 2009 debut.