echomotel

Treasure (1984)

★★★★½ Jun 28, 2026

This feels like the kind of album that changes the weather in a room. The words drift by more as sound than language, but the feeling is so exact that I never really need literal clarity from it. Robin Guthrie's guitars are all light and blur and glow, and Elizabeth Fraser somehow sounds both intimate and unreachable at the same time. Compared with later Cocteau Twins records this one is less pop and more like a suspended dream. Beautiful, mysterious, and still one of the easiest records to disappear into late at night.

Heaven Or Las Vegas (1990)

Heaven Or Las Vegas | 1990 | UK | 4AD | Cad 0012 | Vinyl LP, Album

★★★★½ Jun 28, 2026

I like this album because it manages to be lush and accessible at the same time. A lot of dream pop can feel distant for distance's sake, but this one has real warmth under the blur. Elizabeth Fraser still sounds half above the language and half inside it, yet the melodies are so strong that the emotion comes through immediately. This UK 4AD LP feels like the right home for it because the softness stays intact while the bass still carries real weight. It makes total sense to me that so many people see it as the Cocteau Twins peak. The whole record glows without ever turning weightless.