Cases like caroline’s are becoming rare. They’re from England and have grown—that’s right—from 2017 to today, from a trio to an eight-piece band. The numbers count, especially because in their case, they’re not just numbers, they’re people who play instruments and make it all worthwhile when we listen to them. Not only do we hear them, we feel them. They make themselves heard through what they play and how they play it, how they mix, idealize, and humanize the idea of music. It may not seem like much. Nowadays, when there is so much talk about artificial intelligence, it is almost essential to showcase caroline’s second album, “caroline 2,” as a counterpoint to everything else. This is what happens when happy, friendly people with the same interests, desires, and vision come together.
caroline is an interesting case. The first album was a promise of post-rock, of kids enthusiastic about post-rock, who in the meantime listened to Mark Fell, delighted here and there with concrete music, and wanted to bring these ideas together without a hint of nostalgia, only with genuine intellectual enthusiasm. The eponymous album was, we now realize, a thing with tidy ideas. That’s all, but there’s nothing wrong with that. 2022 is a long way off, and so are the fears of a first album. In 2025, they brought confident music that challenges what we think of post-rock, like Gastr Del Sol, Labradford, and Tortoise did at a certain point, and above all, they create harmony in chaos, they make light appear in the least obvious moments, they are a second life of the Microphones in that magical period of 2000/2001 when they released “It Was Hot, We Stayed In The Water” and “The Glow, Pt.2.” However, it is unfair to judge them by comparison. In 2025, they brought the world some of the best songs we will hear for a long time—“Total Euphoria,” “Tell Me I Never Knew That,” featuring Caroline Polachek, and, get ready, “Coldplay Cover.” It’s not a Coldplay cover, nor is it a parody of one, but a fantastic exercise in what melodies make us believe. And they really do. Whatever you want.
The beats in “When I Get Home” scream caroline’s good use of studio work. A techno beat plays in the background, while voices promise an illuminated crescendo that never happens. Something else happens, very typical of caroline—who learned so well from Microphones—it turns into another song. It’s impossible not to believe that in 2026 they will only be better. They have to be.
AS