Austin, Texas’ popularity as a fertile musical floor continues with Woody Russell’s work. His new EP launch This Is Son Solitaire consists of three tracks that symbolize Russell’s best launched materials. But I get the sensation he’s barely scraped the floor of his capabilities. Mixing art-rock conceits with sturdy pop influences is considered one of This Is Son Solitaire’s chief calling playing cards and every of the EP’s three songs boasts boisterous and full of life manufacturing that frames its virtues in the absolute best sonic mild.

“Swinging for the Fences” is a picture-perfect opener. Russell and his music come surging out of the gate with a robust sound revolving round its rhythm part. The bass and drum tandem go away a mark. The pairing swells out of the combo, by no means overwhelming the encircling devices, however nonetheless planting a vivid auditory flag within the listener’s reminiscence. The blistering guitar enjoying that Russell tacks onto the monitor by no means seems like an afterthought. It, as an alternative, reinforces the track’s strengths and provides a bulldozer-like high quality to chose passages of the monitor.

His potential to make artistic hay from on a regular basis speech is a trademark of his songwriting abilities. These abilities are evident all through the EP’s second minimize “Lifeboat”, as is his penchant for charming imagery. “Lifeboat” has clear-cut instrumentation, nevertheless it’s stressed, and transforms a number of occasions in the course of the course of the monitor with out ever risking dropping listeners alongside the way in which. There’s a sharper emotive edge current in Russell’s voice for this monitor that helps give his high quality lyrics even larger visceral life.

That is Son Solitaire’s finale “Straight House (Unhinged)” is the EP’s peak. First off, I hear it as a showcase for Russell’s dazzling lyric abilities with out ever slipping into pretentious twaddle alongside the way in which. It retains near the identical musical id established by the EP’s two previous tracks whereas increasing on its basis with a distinct facet of theatricality. There’s no query that Russell’s songwriting on this launch owes some money owed to pop track structure, however he confounds our expectations with a free-ranging creativity that makes use of these conventions in recent, creative methods.

It’s typically mentioned about creative works corresponding to motion pictures, books, or music that there’s one thing for everybody right here. It’s regularly a cliché, however not on this case. Woody Russell’s That is Son Solitaire achieves a mainstream sound regardless of the songwriting by no means embracing that aesthetic; its money owed to pop songcraft by no means prohibit the fabric in such a means that Russell writes as if he’s beholden to its inherent facileness. That is Son Solitaire delves deep and makes each effort to not lose listeners alongside the way in which.

Nonetheless, you’re taking Woody Russell’s music on his phrases, otherwise you don’t take it in any respect. He doesn’t pander. The three songs written and recorded for That is Son Solitaire observe their very own Muse down no matter path she chooses and make few if any, concessions to predictability. It’s a difficult work that doesn’t overwhelm you however by no means means that you can coast by way of. Take note of it, nevertheless, and your time is abundantly rewarded. 

Mindy McCall