Chris Garneau
El Radio

The "singer-songwriters" of the new generation, from around 2000 onwards, let's talk a bit: good-looking lads, some more, some less, on the guitar or piano, with a lot of heart and sentiment to offer. Those who managed to break into the mainstream? Whiny, mushy, empty, a total crap, fortunately after a couple of nagging hits they tend to disappear, James Blunt perhaps aside. The more alternative and independent ones? In the vast majority of cases, the same as above, with a bit of cloying suffering (for the listener), sterile pretentiousness, and great references from the in-crowd critics. A dismal paucity, but from time to time I can still find something good, something more creative, that doesn't give me the feeling of drowning in a sticky syrupy concentrate, like this album by one Chris Garneau, for instance. In this context, I've made too many blunders not to proceed with caution, and by doing some research about him, I feared stumbling upon a facsimile of Rufus Wainwright (from pseudo late-adolescent enlightenment to a negative paradigm, a glaring example of the extreme overestimation of this kind of artist); luckily, I met him with the right record, the very subject of this review.

"El Radio" from 2009 is Chris Garneau's second album, and if, as logic would have it, I had listened to his debut, "Music For Tourists", first, I would never have come to know this little gem. MFT is indeed a classic example of an album stuffed with piano ballads (which are worse than a weed infestation when overused), static, frustrating, and whiny, but here the boy shows significant growth, an evolution, he finds two indispensable elements: creativity and balance. And so he comes out with an album with soft and delicate atmospheres, the piano is still the dominant instrument, but here it almost never descends into sterile repetition or that tearful mood that gets on my nerves, replaced by an appealing collage of moods and emotions. Well-crafted, non-trivial arrangements, beautiful melodies, especially "Dirty Night Clowns", a delightful and brilliant little march, in my opinion the stylistic pinnacle of the album thanks to its unpredictable and very appealing flow, which excellently highlights our young American singer-songwriter's thin and expressive voice. The beauty of "El Radio" lies mainly in its informal, intimate, spontaneous nature; each song has something different to offer: the fairytale and subtly ironic atmosphere of "Fireflies", the crooner class of "Hands On The Radio", with a piano melody that wouldn't look out of place on Sir Elton John's latest album, but with a lighter, more dreamy approach, the light and pleasant vintage pop sounds of "No More Pirates", "Home Town Girls" with its delicate gospel-flavored crescendo, nicely accompanied by an organ. This album is full of delicate tunes, bittersweet but lively in their own way; atmospheres that resonate gently but leave a mark in the right place, and among these, I include two brief and very pleasant instrumental episodes, "Les lucioles en Re mineur" and the ghost track "Black Hawk Waltz". Many demonstrations for one conclusion: Chris Garneau is a true talent and, by staying on this path, he might give me many more satisfactions.

And then there are the ballads; never suffocating, well-paced, varied. The initial "Leaving Song" pushes a bit too much on the melodramatic pedal for my taste, but the orchestral arrangement makes quite an impression, and above all, it's a single episode, which can comfortably fit into the whole, "Things She Said" is a very sweet lullaby accompanied by the mellotron, while "Raw And Awake", "Over And Over", and "Cats And Kids" move into more folk territories; here, they reach emotional peaks of great intensity, especially in the first one. There's feeling, there's harmony, and the first to be surprised is me, a bet won, almost unexpectedly, and furthermore, the boy seems set on a virtuous path; the third album, "Winter Games," although not as good as this one, confirms important qualities in terms of stylistic taste and expressiveness. Beautiful songs, beautiful album, beautiful artist, a demonstration of how it is possible to change for the better, to reach important milestones even if the starting point leaves much to be desired, and in this, I see a bit of myself.