Blogarhythms

Though it makes me feel like a passenger of genius canine Mr. Peabody and his bespectacled sidekick Sherman in their WABAC Machine I just couldn’t resist profiling another contemporary artist whose work is a tribute to the aesthetic of yesteryear in today’s blog.

Hailing from Athens, Georgia, birthplace of many an alternative and independent music act, singer, songwriter & multi-instrumentalist Brent Cash (presumably no relation to Tenenbaum family hanger-on Eli Cash) set out to make music the way “they did it back then.” The result is his debut album How Will I Know If I’m Awake, a ten track assemblage of what my radio show co-host Emeyesi might refer to as “car-seat music.” That’s to say, Cash’s work purposely evokes the soulful, sunny, orchestral Pop-Rock of the ’60s and ’70s that the parents of people in our age-group chose as their personal soundtrack back when we were small enough to require a car-seat in order to accompany them on a leisurely weekend drive with the windows down and the radio on.

Sporting layers of intricate vocal harmonies and beautifully melodic instrumental textures, enriched with subtle Soul & Jazz flourishes and embellished by richly orchestrated string & brass arrangements, the songs on How Will I Know If I’m Awake readily betray the sources of Cash’s inspiration. It’s a list of composers, producers, musicians, performers and bands including the likes of Brian Wilson and his Beach Boys, Burt Bacharach, Chicago, The Lovin’ Spoonful, Herman’s Hermits, The Monkees, The Beatles (and Paul McCartney’s work as a solo artist and with Wings), George Martin, America, Crosby Stills Nash, Three Dog Night, The Rascals, Sergio Mendes and a whole host of others.

Cash’s songs are pretty and catchy as hell. His ear for sing-along hooks and melodic, hum-along riffage is impeccable. And his efforts to hire on musicians skilled enough to bring his sophisticated Soft-Rock-meets-Power-Pop compositions to life in a way that sounds and feels authentic to the ’70s AM-radio period are self-evident and appreciated.

Sure, songs like “Digging the Faultline,” “And Had We Ever..” and “When the World Stops Turning” are gorgeous simply for their lyrical quality and vocal harmonies. And they’d probably sound awesome in the hands of a bedroom Pop artist recording on a computer with a host of drum machines and synths at their disposal, a Soft-Rock-enamored Alt-Soul act like N*E*R*D, or David Terry’s one-man Indie-Power-Pop band Aqueduct. But under the care of Cash and his collaborators — who sumptuously orchestrate and meticulously embroider already beautiful songs with luxuriant touches like jazzy guitar noodling, lonely trumpet solos, and resonant xylophone tones, in addition to waves of horns & strings — they’re transformed by some alchemical process into pure mellow gold.

Brent Cash “When the World Stops Turning”

While Cash’s music is undeniably a throwback to what’s supposed to have been a simpler time it’s possessed of a sophistication and complexity that makes much of today’s music, with all it’s technological advances and pristine digital homogenization, seem primitive by comparison. Further proof that knowing one’s past can help make a better today.

- El Keter