Jay Brannan’s third album, Rob Me Blind was released on the 27th of last month. It’s been four years since his last album of original music, 2008′s Goddamned, and three years since the release of his covers album, In Living Cover. Listeners of Jay’s music will be familiar with his folk/singer-songwriter style of simple guitar work backing up skilled, if mellow, vocals accented with minimal percussion and occasional piano accompaniment. The new album delivers more of the same, reliably pleasant to listen to and well-written songs. Jay consistently manages the impressive feat of remaining true to one very specific style of music while keeping each song individual and distinctive when listening to the album as a whole. On Rob Me Blind Jay also stays true to past subject matter. Most of his songs on the new album, as with on Goddamned, deal with the search for love, heartbreak and rejection. There are notable exceptions on this theme, the first of which is, “Beautifully” which was previously released on In Living Cover as one of two original songs but has for Rob Me Blind been re-recorded with a much more robust instrumental track which in my opinion detracts from the tragic beauty of the lyrics which concern the unrequited love (common enough to be familiar to much of Jay’s audience of gay men) of a straight woman for her gay best friend. I understand the intention behind re-packaging the song with a slightly different sound, in order to not release the exact same track twice, but I feel the alterations made to the song were ill-advised. The second exception, and possibly the darkest song on the album as well as the lead single is, “Greatest Hits” which concerns domestic abuse. “Greatest Hits” has the best musical score on the album, making excellent use of delicate horns and surging percussion and background vocals (something Jay rarely utilizes, making them all the more striking). The final departure from relationship themes is, “The State of Music” which is a criticism of the music industry and also a ballad about Jay’s personal struggle to make it as an independent musician. Two songs stand out on first and second listens to the album for very different reasons. The first is very aptly named, “The Spanglish Song” and stands out for just that reason. It is a love song written to a love interest who is, presumably, Spanish speaking and is sung about half in Spanish. The bi-lingual lyrics do nothing to detract from the beauty and flow of the song as Jay did a very good job blending the languages melodically and in a way as to not be jarring. The other song is a departure musically from the rest of Jay’s music. “La La La” starts out much like any other song of Jay’s, with a mellow tempo plucked on a guitar and Jay’s voice flowing smoothly over. Entering the second verse the energy of the song picks up with a multi-layered vocal and prancing horns before shifting abruptly into a verse with harsh, garage-band style guitar and a rough singing style most reminiscent of Sum 41. The song continues in the same vein, sweeping between musical styles several more times before the end of the song. When I first listened to the track I found the transitions distracting, but after paying more attention to the words of the song I realized that Jay was doing something rather clever; in using the differing sounds he illustrates and illuminates the subject matter, which is a turbulent relationship and feelings of betrayal. Overall, Rob Me Blind is a solid and diverse second release of original work to follow 2008′s Goddamned. Previous listener’s of Jay’s music will enjoy the same well-constructed, interesting melodies as well as a couple of interesting departures. New listeners, especially those who enjoy Jay’s idols and primary influences Joni Mitchell, Ani DiFranco and Sinead O’Connor will enjoy a refreshing take on modern folk music with a gay man’s sensitivies and perceptions.
D’awwwwwww. Thanks Austin!
So remember back in April when I was pumping my friend’s EP? Well now he’s got a second one that’s even radder than the first. And just to prove it, here’s a free track.
The full album, EP2 is available here.
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