Old Time Speaker

There was a (mercifully brief) time when soul had its day (or is that ‘way’) with the Top 40 charts -- Rob Thomas went solo, that song Everlast did with Santana was huge, the girl I liked ditched me to go see Macy fucking Gray play to a huge arena crowd with the most obnoxious boy (fag, as it turned out) in our grade... This record is stuck in that era, and god bless it. Pop-influenced bayou rock, if you’ll have it. Some tracks are more or less swampy / rocky / swingy than others. Unassuming verses and almost impossibly catchy choruses. Exceedingly competent melody lines throughout, and rasp-bucket NOLA vocals that belong to some white guy from Belfast, Maine. Well what can I say, the kid’s got soul. Comparable, I suppose, to the likes of Maroon 5, Jason Mraz, John Mayer, Jack Johnson, et al, but I actually like it, so. It’s fitting that the gravelly male voice sounds, hilariously, quite a bit like Macy Gray.

try: 1, 2, 3, 6
no FCCs

*1. ~28 second intro. uptempo, driving song about lovin’ the analog. a cooker. bruce hornsby wishes he wrote this. the chorus completely kills.
*2. supa-cool slinkster. kicks off in right jack johnson style -- stripped-down up-stroke (yeah, wow) island acoustic guitar. enter awesome chorus harmonies, understated clonker piano. really cool vocal stylings -- i like how he sings “wire” and “digital”. “i’m an analog man with a digital case of you”.
*3. on the sinister side. hard-hitting (on the 2, on the 4!) drums and deep twang guitar. starts off uneventful, but wait for the awesome down-and-dirty chorus.
4. sweet slow acoustic. somewhat lush chorus. “it s’alllright, it’s okaaayy...” almost too cute for me.
5. train-track rhythm. happy, upbeat. sounds an awful lot like brighter built to spill.
*6. very relaxed, easy flow on this one. pretty, bloomy, builder sound.
7. quick picked guitar. nice descending melody. deep steamroll/chug backbeat. d’aww: “you’ve kept me wondering if it’s worth wondering”.
8. slowww slink. deep chord-based piano. verrry bluesy.
9. tocky acoustic and light keys. drums in for a straight bop beat. seems to tell a fable/story. has a camp song singalong chorus. ends on a stomper/clapper vamp.
10. easy strummed acoustic. pretty, melodic, spare enough ingredients.