The debut album from Sumia, Until We Shine Again is a great and easy listen that really worms its way into your head and it’s a feel-good release that you’ll keep wanting to come back to.
Opener Dive is a wonderful start to proceedings, with lush instrumentation and very smooth-sounding vocals on the top, and it helps immerse you in the album from the start, and with great songs such as Sirena and Arc Lights really resonating in particular, it has to be said that Until We Shine Again is a largely engaging listen and Sumia certainly know how to write a good song or two!
The only thing that really lets the album down is the slight lack of variation between some of the songs – there are some tracks are similar to one another and constructed in the same sort of format, which is a little disappointing. Whilst there’s certainly no shame in playing things safe, it would have been nice for a little more variation at times and whilst the album does flow well from song to song, sometimes at times it’s difficult to fully maintain interest.
As a whole, Until We Shine Again is a nice little album and although it’s perhaps not the most adventurous of pieces, Sumia have really made something to be proud of here.
7/10
