Brett Howe - Each Passing Day

Hear The Track Here

During my usual Saturday night debacle while propping up the bar in Mix Radio's chatroom, I often get to hear artists who I wouldn't normally hear. T'was just this past Saturday or so in fact that I made the musical acquaintance of Brett Howe. It takes a lot for me to stop my ridiculous cavorting to pay attention to what is being played and it says something that one of his tracks made me stop and listen. Goes without saying though that I can't for the life of me remember what it was called but neither can I remember getting kicked out of there at the crack of a chilly Sunday morning either, but there goes a typical Gilmore weekend for you. A blur of blurs. Even now, after having lived with this track for a while, I couldn't swear whether it was this one or not.

Acoustic folk; a guy, a guitar and a voice is the name of the game but even so I think the track I heard wasn't doubletracked like this track. Grrr, I suppose I'm going to have to go take a squint at the playlist or this will drive me crazy. In the meantime, let's contemplate Each Passing Day. Being a guitarist myself, I do appreciate someone who can do a good job of fingerpicking. For me, its one of the strengths of the acoustic genre, especially of you can get it to reach the dizzy heights set by one Christopher Martin Hansen. Haven't got a clue who that is? Do yourself a favour: soundclick search... While Brett doesn't quite reach that stage, he's certainly got a very nice acoustic lick happening in this track and, to my ears, the double tracking worked although I'd have to caution against overuse. As it is, Brett does it with just the right amount of finesse.

The essential ingredient in this kind of setup is the one place where a lot of people fall down. When you limit yourself in this way, the song becomes much more important than it would do, say in a fully scored track. The reason I first paid attention to Brett's work was because the song itself tugged at me, as much as the style it was encased in. Regular readers will know how susceptible I am to a good song, and Each Passing Day is a cracker, especially in this natural, unadorned way. Moreover, it doesn't drag its feet getting where it needs to go either, clocking in smartly around two and a half minutes.

Highly Recommended Folk Rock.