Followers of in-limbo indie-rock band Lydia won’t feel like they fell too far from indie-band tree with The Cinema’s debut album, My Blood is Full of Airplanes. Though, they may want to crawl back up that tree to Lydia’s branch. The Cinema consists of Lydia’s lead singer, Leighton Antelman, and producer Matt Malpass. Antelman didn’t run with that organic, Metric-y musicianship into his new music project, but Malpass did hold onto those interesting backbeats which (still) complement Leighton Antelman’s trancey voice.

The album opens with “Satellites” where Malpass’s keyboard-synth backbeats are a little canned and don’t seem like much more than a head-bopper at a girls’ slumber party. But, the song does open up. There’s a refreshing use of instrumental layering that steers this song and the album away from what would be an unfortunate turn towards Owl City, or the poppy like.

“The Wolf,” second track, also embodies the album’s layered musicality and does more lyrically than most of the album. This track’s verses and chorus hook aren’t trying to be something they’re not. “I played the wolf, and left it to the sheep to figure out.” No mountain-moving poetry or pretentious love-babble; just fun words to sing while grooving to a simple musical journey.

Which is indicative of the album in general. It doesn’t move mountains or depict an interesting-enough love story lyrically in any song. While the hooks are simple enough to go with the boppiness of the production, Antelman could have watered down the wordiness of most of his verses, and then danciness of the album would have made a little more sense.

While there’s usually nothing wrong with an interweaving of sentiments, this album seems like it should have focused less on metaphors and lyrical images and more on the unique meshing of vocalizations and hooky Protools riffs. Halfway through the album, “Picasso” introduces simple piano riffs that create an interesting juxtaposition between synthetic and organic sounds. The overdone visual art references weren’t necessary, but the hooky chord progressions and on-the-up-beat instrumentation makes up for the somewhat empty metaphors.

The album peaks at “Kinetic” - a good example of what The Cinema seems to do best: Poppy, synthetic instruments slowly building upon one another and simple lyrics getting lost in Antelman’s equally-layered, hypnotic vocals. Unfortunately, this less-rock/more-pop version of Antelman’s other band probably won’t be enough to swoon his Lydia diehards.

★★★★☆

*This review was composed by Cydney Hedgpeth