She & Him Build A Wall Of Sound With “Never Wanted Your Love”

She & Him
“Never Wanted Your Love”
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

With a jangle of acoustic guitar and a wave of sweeping strings, “Never Wanted Your Love” — She & Him’s first single in two years — picks up right where their previous album left off. Technically, this is a breakup song, directed at the man who stole Zooey Deschanel’s heart and left it broken. Shame on you, Ben Gibbard! Zooey sounds happy enough, though, crooning her husky, old-school pop melodies with all the cutesy charm of a lifesize Kewpie Doll. Borrowing heavily from Phil Spector, M. Ward builds up his own Wall of Sound in the background, coating everything in reverb and beefing up the arrangement with violin triplets, tambourines, background harmonies, keyboards, and the like. Don’t pay attention to the lyrics, which could’ve been lifted from a lovesick middle-schooler’s diary. Just focus on the sound, which rustles up the best parts of ‘50s and ‘60s pop music to endearing effect.