My Old Kentucky Blog,
Album Review
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Good week for bedroom composers here on MOKB. Today it’s Boy Without God, the nom de guerre of New Yorker by way of Beantown, Gabriel Birnbaum. A one-time jazz prodigy, Birnbaum picked up the guitar in his late teens, and set off into the uncharted waters of avant-pop. His latest, God Bless The Hunger, represents his first effort beyond the confines of his four walls, but rather than finding himself intimated or overwhelmed by the greater scope and fidelity of a well-furnished analog studio, our young friend uses it to its full advantage.
As a songwriter, he is already accomplished well beyond his years, his best material calling to mind names as seemingly disparate as Jim Croce, Bon Iver, Bill Callahan and Van Morrison. But it’s as an arranger where Birnbaum truly distinguishes himself, seamlessly blending styles and incorporating his own free jazz lineage in a manner that swings from impossible beauty to unspeakable violence without warning. Joe Henry is one of the few current artists who feel like an apt comparison, but Birnbaum’s Godspeed! You Black Emperor meets Captain Beefheart freakouts might even leave Henry languid. It’s a little like listening to a mashup of Dongs Of Sevotion and Love Cry, and it’s occasionally nothing short of transcendent.
Gold Bless The Hunger will officially drop on June 21st, but you can sneak a preview and pre-order at Boy Without God’s Bandcamp page
06/08/11
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