Salt Lake City’s The Mellons make 60s-minded pop with a taste for bright colours, odd turns and plenty of studio detail. The Mellons In Color moves from electric, acoustic and 12-string guitars into piano, Hammond organ, Mellotron, brass, strings and small percussion touches, with glockenspiel, tubular bells, recorder, banjo and even kazoo in the wider palette. The result points toward baroque pop and psychedelic rock, but the arrangements keep changing shape rather than settling into one period-piece sound.
Andrew Colin Beck and Denney Fuller produced the record and handle much of its playing, backed by Ian on drums, Rob on vocals, Glenn Brigman on guitars, and a larger cast contributing flute, cello, violin, extra voices and sound effects. There’s a clear pleasure in the handmade detail, from the choir on “Things Gone By” to the flute arrangement on “With A Girl Like You”, while the split mixing credits give the opening tracks a slightly different place in the sequence. It’s a paid release with a vinyl LP available, aimed at anyone who likes melodic 60s rock, pop that takes detours, and records where the arrangement keeps offering another instrument to notice.
