Stick Season, Sunny

What did the octopus need to complete his pirate costume? Three hooks.

From Noah Kahan we have here very smartly produced indie rock/folk rock channeled through one-man Americana, with a hard New England / Vermont aesthetic. The sound reminds me of a dozen or more acts from the last twenty years, both in the particular vocal timbre and the sonic production, but the niche play works for what it is.

The first three tracks are the same as starting the game with your aces. Three hooks, right? "Northern Attitude" has a slow guitar build into vocal drop, full with reverb, or solo vocals into more guitars with some gimmick (a yelp from way backstage, kick drum, etc). "Stick Season," surely the biggest accomplishment on the album, has an addictive hook and logical progression through the song. Stitched throughout are personal lyrics about relationships, alcohol, weed, depression, and Vermont. This is what you build an album around. "All My Love" brings in more of a grass cutting, drawing the hook out from "retrograaaade" to the three hit "all-my-love." I list all these little details that have stuck with me because the rest of the album hasn't. I don't remember ever being displeased, but I find the earworms are all front loaded, with the rest feeling mostly like retreads. And maybe there were between one and three slow sappy songs at the end. It's 55 minutes, you know, just a bit more than I myself am looking for in this niche.

Kahan interviewed by Genius, who has an interview staff I guess, about the "Stick Season" lyrics. Mostly guessable, nothing that's really off the page in the words. (I am surprised to hear what his speaking voice sounds like.) The interesting thing, for me, is the front note about TikTok. TikTok being my assumed reason why Kahan had such a huge recent concert presence, etc. I don't know why I find that interesting, except more and more it seems like popular music channels through an app and virtual-place that I'm not in at all, so names that are seemingly huge come as quite a surprise. I assume this will only accelerate in time.