aaron joseph russo - you can’t win them all

aaron joseph russo

you can’t win them all
self-released; 2019

​4.0 out of 5

By Matt Jensen

aaron joseph russo is an artist from Melbourne, Australia who recently released you can't win them all. He is a young guy at twenty-four years of age and he explains the album was written during a transitional period. At thirty-eight I will say there are plenty of other transitions I went through long after that age but it’s relative and when you dig into this question it becomes philosophical. I think for most people in their mid 20’s it’s a period where you start to really feel divided between the carefree nature of being young and finding a different type meaning as you become an adult.

The songs have a warm melancholy to them and are lush. The album was more about mood for a number of reasons. For one thing, I had a hard time understanding the lyrics on some songs but even more so is the consistent feeling you get when you listen to these songs sequentially.

The vocals are drenched in reverb and russo sounds similar to Bon Iver at times. He also sings barely above a whisper as you can hear on the opener “wish” which is a highlight. This is a great song not only because of the melodies but because of the details. The slight detuning and the other elements which are panned hard left and right sound like they are coming from down the hall. It’s a beautiful song.

He has some success with a song like “so tired” which is lush and a dream pop enhanced song not too far away from the bands like Beach House or Auburn Lull. “again” is very still and meditative. I was trying to make out the lyrics here and have ambivalent feelings about not understanding what he says. The vocals almost act like another element which was very cool but I was wondering if there was another layer of meaning that I missed out on.

As the album progresses there are some highlights. “what are you doing” is both hopeful and melancholy while “when the feeling fades” contains a memorable vocal melody.

​This is a cohesive release and russo established a sound with this sequence of songs. It works really well from beginning to end. Some people might call this depressing music. I for one think it will be a sad day if people stop listening to music like this. You are missing the point if you think depressing music is supposed to make you depressed. There are many things it can do but perhaps most importantly it can reflect moods that sometimes words can’t capture. Once that is recognized it creates empathy which if all goes well will mutate into a similar pattern of energy we call solace.

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