One of the recent and certainly popular trends in indie music is how much a lot of it sounds like pop music. In fact, the line between pop and indie music has never been more blurred; call it pop music getting evolved or indie music getting glamorous. As a matter of fact, the current crop of indie bands that do veer into pop territory are so good that they leave the genre classification totally upto the listener’s discretion. Add this brother-sister duo, the Driscolls aka Blondefire, to this list of hip indie bands that so effortlessly cross over into the realms of pop music. The band initially started off with the name Astaire (in reference to Fred Astaire) because they felt their music was danceable, and Blondefire makes you dance for sure.

As if the album and some of the song titles are not suggestive enough, Young Heart is a party album. But it is not some kind of a club album. The music is dancy, but this is an album for those partiers who are also conscious about the music they dance to: the snobs. While there is everything wrong with a snob being picky about what music to dance to at a party, all can be forgiven in this case, considering how amazing Blondefire’s music is.

Young Heart just brims with cheeriness and warmth. The album is perfectly crafted with the sweetest sounding music ever. In an unusual but not entirely strange way, the whole record has a similar vibe to Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want To Have Fun:” great bubbly pop songs that are incredibly catchy and absolutely from the heart. The music has an ampleness quality with lush layers of synthesizers and guitars; this is made complete by sister Driscoll Erica’s soft whispy voice, which will put anyone in a joyful mood. No wonder “Where The Kids Are” from this record is featured on a very cheerful commercial for Honda Civic with cutesy balloons popping out of the car and forming a giant heart shape at the end….aww, how cute!

But the Driscolls take their music far more seriously than just wanting to have fun and sounding cute. They do throw a great party, but they are conscious of staying out of the revelry, making sure everyone else is having a good time.

Rating: A

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