Fed up of that old verse -chorus, verse-chorus, middle eight, verse - chorus to fade shebang? Then Jon Garcia's the man for you. Coming to the UK soon, Jon announces himself with this independantly produced cd that is generous in the extreme with its big arrangements and overflowing profusion of musical ideas: probably about half a dozen separate ideas per song, and there's fourteen songs.
Most of these songs clock in at around four to five minutes, pretty short by prog rock standards, but the feeling that these are "pieces", rather than songs, changing dramatically in mood as they take you on a ride through some mixed terrain, put me very much in mind of British bands of the early to mid seventies. There's too much variation to make any direct comparison but anywhere in the area of The Enid, Camel or even Be-Bop Deluxe, might give you an idea - not that any of these bands make his list of influences on his myspace site(myspace.com/jongarciaportland), so maybe it's just me. Oh, and there's quite a bit of soul in his vocal stylings, and a smidgeon of jazz in the arrangements at times.
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When he contains his inventiveness and gives the song a focus, something quite beautiful emerges, as on "Life's String Symphony"; in isolation these songs are memorable and moving, but in the context of the album as a whole, they're a little lost. Pulling off the trick of successfully dealing with both sides of your muse is not easy, at least not in terms of keeping your audience with you. I guess being able to download single tracks on to your MP3 keeps everybody happy. How his more complex arrangements will translate to solo intimate venues here in the UK I'm not sure, but I would expect a fair bit of fierce intensity interspersed with oases of calm: could be interesting.
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Press at Ness http://www.nessmp3.com/music/jongarcia
More http://www.myspace.com/jongarciaportland
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