bent jetty - honest approach

Bent Jetty 

Honest Approach
self-released; 2013

4.0 out of 5

By Dan Alcantara

Bent Jetty is a band from Orange County, CA that makes absolutely perfect folk-pop. We'll start things off right there because it was the very first impression that I had of the band. Though they met in high school, it wasn't until college that they tried playing music together. They recorded their first EP Honey Be Wild in a bedroom, though you would never guess that its origins were born of sheets and sleep. This review, however, is of their most recent effort, Honest Approach.

With a solid lineup that included adding another friend from high school, the band chose to record Honest Approach in a studio over a period of nine months, which feels like a long time for four songs. For the most part, it's resulted in a tighter production, which doesn't say a whole lot. They didn't have much improving that needed to be done after Honey Be Wild. The studio does lend the band a bit more credibility as they hope to make this their business card, as it were.

The band has said they've been compared to everything from Mumford & Sons to John Mayer to Phil Collins (don't even get me started), but I simply don't hear it at all. If the band is anything, they're California's answer to Fleet Foxes. With reverberous harmonies and folk-inspired pop songs, the band is sun and sand where Fleet Foxes is rain and trees. Starting the EP is the upbeat but not quite driving, "Human Tribe" with its catchy guitar riffs sprinkled throughout the song. It's the perfect intro to the band and really does a good job summing up what they're about in terms of sound. "Old Carruthers" is a driving folk tune that, in other hands, would make an amazing country tune but the lads in Bent Jetty make it into more of their pitch-perfect folk-pop. They quiet down a bit with "Red King," a much more mellow tune than the other three songs. It feels like a good song for driving home. "Favored Few" feels like the band is channeling the Scottish indie-pop of Belle & Sebastian and makes for the perfect close to an amazing EP.

If I had to choose something constructive to say in a critical way, it'd be that this EP is simply too short. I want more songs. For now, one can only hope that they don't take another nine months to record their follow-up to this.

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