Johnny Gifford is an artist from Fitchburg, Massachusetts who recently released Bravo, Bravo. He mentions on his Bandcamp page, “Recorded entirely & organically on 4 track cassette tape using the Tascam Portastudio MF-P01. I really limited myself to only 4 tracks per song and used one 20-minute tape i had lying around, just to make my life harder.” Gifford might be too young to remember that it was actually the norm not that long. At any rate I thought it was cool.
The first song “Butterscotch” revolves around a rickety lo-fi guitar, a couple sine waves and spoken word. There is no other way to describe the vocals as melodramatic spoken words. It reminded me of my college days hearing philosophy majors at an open mic trying to conjure some deep and meaningful information. I’m not saying that in a pejorative way but this was the feeling I was getting the whole time. There is some very welcome levity with “Congress 2.” The song revolves around guitar, bass, drums and horns. It’s the horns which are really the star of the show here. I enjoyed the melodies and general vibe of the tune. “Hearts of Colorado'' is very different. It’s lo-fi drone metal at its best. There are distorted guitars with some hall reverb and monotone vocals which are barely noticeable. The vocals are very low in the track. “Philmont Grace” is a little over a minute and sounds like a dream sequence for a horror film. “Remnants” is the highlight and more reminiscent of ’90s indie rock in the spirit of early Pavement. This release is all over the place in terms of style and theme. Some of it sounds like a B-side from early Caretaker, some like ’90s indie rock. I can’t say this was a cohesive release to my ears and I didn’t find a signature sound that would make me recognize the artist. That being said I enjoyed the tracks when considering them individually. There are some solid ideas on this release. I wish Gifford luck as he evolves and continues to grow as an artist.
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