So I’m going to try something new: record reviews!  Starting with something I’m going to call grab bag reviews.  Once a week or so, I’m going to go look at the new records from Boston in Bandcamp, find one or more thing that I like, and do some kind of review.  I’m going to write out my ground rules here, since this is the internet and that seems to be the kind of thing people do:

• Positive reviews (why write about things that aren’t good?)
• Focus on genres I care most about: home recording, singer-songwriter, hip hop, maybe some experimental or electronic stuff if I’m in the mood
• Local!  Extra points if there are songs are about Boston, because that will make me like them.
• Obscurity.  If it feels like no one else will review the record, that is a good reason to review it.

Five wordy, hushed, self-conscious, charming, home recorded songs.  The narrative that emerges is of one more college student new to Boston, trying to make sense of a new environment,  The cover is the Huntington Avenue Y.

Dylan Citron sings in a voice so gentle it can seem androgynous and strums on a dry, thin, acoustic guitar.  Crowd noise from parties, distorted drum machines, vocal samples, and slow, melodic piano lines all take their place in arrangements that are familiar but not stale or derivative.

The last song, “The Times Are Never-A-Changin'” drifts slowly over a piano arpeggio, punctuated by the crunching up and down of the piano’s sustain pedal.  The lyrics suggest a young narrator grappling for his own relationship with the violence in the world around him, and the song ends with a brief sample of a gospel recording.  As the title suggests, it’s a protest song that doesn’t know quite what to say, and it’s one of the highlights of a really nice EP.