Circa Waves - Sad Happy (LP)

Circa Waves hit a strange, timely nerve with Sad Happy, a record that arrived in two halves, with the “Happy” portion landing digitally in January 2020 and the full album following on March 13, 2020. A week later, the world shut its doors. You could hear that split mood even without the calendar reminder. The Liverpool quartet has always written big choruses, but here they pack sugar and salt in equal measure, sequenced so you feel the rush first and the ache after.

The “Happy” side is lean and eager. Guitars come in bright and clipped, drums snap, and Kieran Shudall sounds like he is racing the clock. The title track, Sad Happy, sprints on a pogo-stick pulse, a neat trick that turns anxiety into something you can shout back at the speakers. Be Your Drug delivers the kind of chant they built their early reputation on, yet it is dressed with a modern shine that nods to the more polished turn on their 2019 LP. Jacuzzi is another standout from this side, buoyed by a nimble riff and a chorus made for festival crowds, the kind you imagine echoing across fields even if those fields were off limits when the record dropped. Move to San Diego leans into escapist storytelling, a postcard fantasy with a hook that sticks.

Flip to the “Sad” side and the tempo shifts, but the band does not lose their bite. Synths and piano share space with the guitars, and the rhythm section, Sam Rourke on bass and Colin Jones on drums, plays with more air, letting the songs breathe. Joe Falconer threads tasteful guitar lines around that space, never overcrowding it. The writing leans inward, though it never turns murky. You get the sense of a band comfortable widening the frame, interested in melancholy textures without abandoning the knack for a big refrain. That push and pull is the point. It is right there in the title, and it lands because they commit to both sides.

As the fourth Circa Waves album, Sad Happy reads like a bridge. You can trace it back to the scrappy immediacy of Young Chasers and the heavier punch of Different Creatures, then hear how the sleeker, piano-forward touches of What’s It Like Over There? informed this tighter, two-act structure. What sticks is how sure-handed it feels. Even the brightest moments carry a crease of worry, and even the most reflective tracks find a melodic turn that lingers. The band has talked about wanting to reflect modern whiplash, that feeling of doomscrolling and joy scrolling in the same five minutes. That vibe hums through these songs without turning the album into a concept straitjacket.

If you collect Circa Waves vinyl, this is a fun one to play as intended, one mood per side. The sequencing really pops on wax, the “Happy” run front-loading the hooks, the “Sad” run letting the low end bloom. Sad Happy vinyl crops up regularly at indie shops and online, and it sits nicely next to the earlier ones if you are aiming to complete the set. If you like to buy Circa Waves records online, keep an eye out for editions bundled with the earlier catalog, since Circa Waves albums on vinyl tend to get snatched up whenever they tour. And if you are crate digging in a Melbourne record store, or browsing sellers that ship vinyl records Australia wide, this album is a reliable score that gets plenty of spins after you bring it home.

Critical response at the time keyed in on the split design and the band’s sure-footed hooks, and fans quickly picked favorites from each half. The live set that followed leaned hard on the title track and Be Your Drug for good reason. They land fast, and they leave the right aftertaste. That balance is what makes Sad Happy worth revisiting a few years on. It catches Circa Waves at a moment when the world tilted, and it responds with something immediate, then something reflective, both crafted with care. Play it straight through, or live with a side at a time. Either way, it holds up.