Since 2010’s Teen Dream, Beach House have stressed the fact that, despite an identity-shift from dream pop perfectionists to indie rock heavyweights, their sound hasn’t really changed all that much. In a sense, this is true: their music has remained underpinned by the robust, heightened emotional states evoked by singer/organist Victoria Legrand’s vocal turns and guitarist Alex Scally’s skyward hooks. Their changes have felt entirely organic, the work of a band fully aware of exactly where they are and exactly what they’re doing at every turn. It takes an impressive amount of confidence to pull that off, and "Sparks", off the Baltimore duo’s forthcoming Depression Cherry, proves they haven’t lost an ounce of it.

The song opens with a hymnal sigh made up of Legrand’s multi-tracked vocals, sliding against each other as though fighting their way out of a massive, spiderwebbed cathedral. It's broken by a ripping, shoegaze-y guitar, smothered in feedback—noisier than we’ve come to expect from Beach House, but by no means messy. Knocking drums follow and the song clicks into place, an organ seemingly lifted from their debut keeping time beneath the rumble. "It’s a gift taken from the lips," Legrand intones at one point, cutting a path to the song’s lovelorn heart. "Sparks" is like a distilled version of the devotionals with which Beach House first found their footing, pulling from the past while looking resolutely into the future.