Brandon De La Cruz – Disguise
Similar artists: Arthur Russell, Sufjan Stevens, Phosphorescent
Genre: Indie Folk
Brandon De La Cruz isn’t a songwriter, really, but rather an explorer into the otherworldly using music as a device.
For many of the great artists, their work is merely a way to access divine secrets. Or so they hope. The majority have an inclination toward going on this path from a young age. The majority of these put in plenty of elbow grease in developing the skills that they’ll need to navigate these roads. But do they ever find it, or are they merely vessels?
Hearing Charlie Parker was the worst thing that could’ve happened to John Coltrane. It set him on a mad dash to learn everything that there was to learn about music. It made him want to change his musical style every few months. And, while it broke him physically and spiritually, it gifted the world “A Love Supreme.”
Brandon De La Cruz’s “Disguise” sounds like a document of an artist deep in the process of torturing himself. One can’t exactly encourage this. But one shouldn’t turn away from the beauty it produces.
Beyond the gentle acoustic guitars and the South American flute, De La Cruz’s damaged poetry and brittle voice ring out like the call of a Shaman venturing into the unknown. We can just be thankful De La Cruz is still searching.
Sam Saunders – Rock ‘N’ Rollism
Similar artists: The Beatles, Electric Light Orchestra, David Bowie, Cheap Trick, The Rolling Stones
Genre: Classic Rock
Sam Saunders goes back into music’s past to understand where we might be going, and the results are frightening and fascinating. “Rock ‘N’ Rollism” is the proverbial dance on the edge of the volcano.
Nothing advances forever, not even rock n’ roll. Resources are finite. And the most important for creating good pop music is enthusiasm, one of which we seem to be in short supply of.
When progress stops, the only way to go forward is to go back to where things started falling apart. In our case, that would be the late 1960s in an era in which the greatest records were made, they were bought by millions, and the music industry could be set up.
Sam Saunders’ “Rock ‘N’ Rollism” sounds like Lennon & McCartney finding out about “Pet Sounds” and aiming to record their own version using cheap, acoustic guitars. It’s inherently lo-fi but ambitious.
It sounds like a rock n’ roll jam played at a high-school party, yes. But there’s a murmur of melancholy and discontent. Like Sam Saunders, everyone hoping to move forward with this music-making business might need to look back first.
