The Portland-via-Brooklyn popsters Pure Bathing Culture are the splinters of folk outfit Vetiver, with Daniel Hindman and Sarah Versprille branching off to do their own thing with PBC.

Relocating to the opposite coast from their Atlantic hometown, they started to take their newly birthed indie act up a notch and set the ball rolling, with Richard Swift offering them the chance to record their debut EP at his studio pretty soon after. Their self-titled debut is sweetly delirious, a tad Beach House-y and frankly, a bit twee. But not the saccharine, Splenda-twee: a gently heartwarming and endearing listen.

‘Ivory Coast‘ has caused quite the stir cropping up just about everywhere. With it’s autumnal whistling and winter-glow melodies, it’s easy to see why the track is piquing interest; orange-dappled pavements and wisps of bonfire smoke make for a sublime backdrop to this crisp pop tune. Versprille’s delicate and airy vocals douse the trembling guitar with a seamless fuzz, and everything in the song just sort of slots together with ease.

‘Lucky One’ flutters across with a shimmer of back-to-basics Americana, mashed up all higgledy-piggledy with cheap drum machines and spiritual orchestrations of synth organ. It doesn’t really sound like it should work, but it ends up being hazy and dreamy, the genre-splicing alleviating some of the sugary talk of cuckoo clocks.

Lead track ‘Gainesville’ is the EP’s surefire highlight, with dark ‘n’ stormy goth-twee guitar lines and woozy lo-fi verses, and an edge unseen on the other cuts. The chorus is a bit jarring, straying off into the clouds with songbirds and out of the sullen grump-filled woe: for an EP which has a clearly defined atmosphere, it sticks out as something unusual. Which is nice, because there’s only so much happiness you can take in one sitting…

Versprille and Hindman sharpened their talons with folk, and their grassroots approach to their music hasn’t been altogether lost among the fresh cadre of clicky 808 snare and static synthesizers. It still feels rustic. Twee-pop has the potential to get on people’s nerves, with a tendency towards the vapid and “precious”; but although this is sentimental in droves, there’s an honesty to the flawed recordings and a Brooklynite apathy which almost pokes fun at their own glee. Instead of frantically over-thinking the noises from Pure Bathing Culture, it’s entirely possible that they’re just happy making music they enjoy.

Listen to Pure Bathing Culture EP