Brian McTear is known primarily as a producer, having manned the boards for Burning Brides, Mazarin, and a host of others, including orchestral indie popster Matt Pond PA, so his debut album as Bitter, Bitter Weeks comes as a bit of a shock. The same guy who's spent a career bricking and mortaring walls of sound for other musicians, it turns out, has a soft spot for the minimal, getting his strum on with almost no adornment over the course of a 35-minute long-player.
This can be a perilous path-- stripping a bunch of songs bare and laying them out for the world exposes weak writing faster than anything, and too much consistency of texture quickly becomes boring-- but McTear demonstrates his engineer's ear with an attention to detail and variation that keeps things rolling pretty well. His songwriting doesn't exactly bring to mind Dylan in the basement, but he's got a knack for a melody, and as a lyricist he's certainly got a good internal editor; no cringeworthy stuff here.
"Sage" kicks off the record abruptly with McTear's multitracked acoustics laying a bed of gothic fingerpicking and his distinctive, gritty tenor drawing forth lines about psychological discovery and "learn[ing] how to love without your whole body." "Taking Pills" adds a subtle steel guitar to the mix for textural variety, and several other songs employ such subdued measures to add more body to the music. "Daylight Savings Is Over" is contoured by a weird, high-pitched pinging, while McTear's strumming trades in drastic dynamics and details, in multitracked harmonies, exhausting walks through dirty streets.
The closing pair of "Still as a Stream" and "Water in the Basement" each employ backing harmonies from cohorts including Matt Pond and Mazarin's Quentin Stoltzfus, while organs hum low in the rear of "Still as a Stream", building on the ancient feel of the guitar work. "Water" has more of a backporch feel, with lazily picked banjo and wandering harmonica weaving their way around McTear's steady strumming and powerful voice.
The two best songs each resort to the fully unfleshed sound of McTear and his guitar, though each takes a markedly different path. "You Paralyze My Heart" is sparsely strummed and intensely intoned, with the opening line, "Dear, I just want to say/ You paralyze my heart/ I feel like a thousand trucks all barreling/ Some loaded with sparks/ And some with gasoline." Meanwhile, "TN" is a brisk acoustic pop tune, replete with casual "hey hey hey's." McTear outlines the storm and stress of relocating during a relationship, summing up his frustration with the lines, "I wish I could hold my breath/ And it would cure this unrest."
Of course, given that this album is largely a one-man affair, there are moments where the excitement dims a bit, but it's remarkable how well McTear does keeping it interesting and engrossing. It's not going to win over anyone who can't stand these kinds of acoustic troubadours, but it'll light a small fire in most anyone who's into that sort of thing.
