For all of the talk you’ll hear in reviews about how Light Upon the Lake takes inspiration from the Byrds, the Beatles, and soul music (and every critic ever is saying it), it still feels wonderfully refreshing. I think it’s because guitar rock — and guitar pop even more so — feels like a dying culture.

Take the opening verse of Dave’s Song. There are a couple things immediately at work here. Most notably, I think, are the arpeggios picked throughout. Stolen straight from country music, who stole it from guitar pop (who stole it from jazz, for what it’s worth), this style is uncommon in most rock these days. It’s a level of complexity above what we’re used to. It sounds good though.

The second notable thing is singer Julian Ehrlich’s voice, which will be immediately familiar to Unknown Mortal Orchestra fans. Frankly, he’s perfectly suited for this material. His sad-sounding, dreamy falsetto works better for this material than it does on the recent work from Unknown Mortal Orchestra.

Almost every song follows this strategy: Light Upon the Lake, No Matter Where We Go, The Falls, and so on. Many of these songs are clearly inspired by the band’s favourite old-school 60’s guitar pop. A lot of bands have done this, but few do it as well as Whitney.

There are, of course, a lot of soul influences as well. This is clear from the band’s brass section. It’s most obvious in the album’s more upbeat tracks. But when it all comes together perfectly, it congeals into these brilliant moments that stick with you.

For my money, Polly is the clear standout track here: the guitar pop and the soul-inspired brass come together perfectly, and Erhlich sings “I know in the past you left me with no heart; How cheap were the nights you used to keep me warm?”. In that moment, you know you’ve heard something special. And who it sounds like is unimportant, because it moves past it.

What makes Whitney’s debut so great is, despite knowing as well as we do who and what they sound like, they move past that and make us feel something.

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I’ve heard some publications herald this record as the best album of the decade, which is pure link-bait. Calling any record “the best of the decade” when we’re only four years into it is pre-emptive to the point of idiocy. Whether the album stands the test of time or not is irrelevant. This is the album we needed today, not six years from now.

With that in mind, listen to Under The Pressure, Red Eyes, Eyes To The Wind, and Burning to get a taste of what Lost in the Dream is all about. For many people, this will be their album of the year, and I doubt that claim is hyperbolic.

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Cayucos, the opening track, gives you a great idea of what to expect. Put down whatever you’re doing, grab a beach towel and prepare a mojito. It’s time to sunbathe. High School Lover carries on with the same sort of stupidly catchy beach pop that cheers you up without insulting your intelligence. A Summer Thing hits it right on the nose with a 400-pound hammer, but that’s kind of the point — subtlety isn’t Cayucas’ strong suit.

The comparisons I keep seeing are Beck on anti-depressants and Vampire Weekend. In reality, it’s kind of like Vampire Weekend got really drunk with Beck on a Saturday afternoon and performed an impromptu live show somewhere on the ocean shore. On another level, the album’s going to amuse potheads the same way that Tenacious D causes a sense of the giggles. I don’t smoke it, but if I did, the title track would probably blow my mind. As it is now, it’s just like the rest of the album: Disgustingly catchy, brilliantly fun and irresistible.

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