Casey Brandt – The Day I Marry The Sea

This entry was posted by owl and bear staff on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 12:59 am.

2007, Mungler Winslowe

The Day I Marry The Sea is a breezy, mostly relaxing record, even though most of Casey Brandt’s songs sound the same, and make the record occasionally tiring.

The song format (layered, multi-tracked strumming acoustic guitars with big, “boom-pause-boom” drums) isn’t bad in and of itself, but just because it’s reminiscent of Warren Zevon’s “Splendid Isolation” doesn’t mean that the formula can carry an entire record.

The album begins on a very high note with Brandt’s best song, the ironically titled “The End.” The song’s beating, head-bobbing acoustic rock is pleasing and refreshing. The second track, “That’s Enough”, is a slow folk-rock song and is followed by the eponymous song, a rich, ambient, wavy track that flows as much as its title and subject matter suggest.

“Union of the Bee” is where the record stalls. The first few seconds of the track make big promises with an indie guitar-hook, but the Isaac Brock-styled vocal melodies just cannot deliver, and ultimately disappoint. The only real low point on the record is on “Thank You Western Man,” where the lyrics are just kind of bad (”Thank you western man/For all your awesome plans/Like pay-the-earth on Sundays and/All that other stuff”).

The record is too homogeneous, but the songs are strong enough, and it makes a good deal of promise for Brandt’s future career.

B-