BARR

Summary (5RC)

By Erin Wolf
Published: March 21st, 2007 | 2:24pm

Picture a random dude in his bathroom, done shaving, doing the fingers-rubbing-chin bit, looks down at the bathroom tiles, then back up at the mirror, then starts venting, talking, reminiscing, gesticulating, conversing with himself — just a dude and a mirror. Well, this dude’s name is Brendan Fowler, and he calls himself and his stream-of-consciousness independent musings “BARR” — except these musings have found their way out of the bathroom and away from the mirror and to the microphone.

Paired with various spare additions of piano, drums, and bass, Fowler uses these instruments as a backdrop for his speaking voice, tinged with a West Coast skater drawl and dotted with words and phrases such as “sucks,” “gnarly,” “Armageddon breakup,” and “special art rebels”. Fowler’s first release, Beyond Reinforced Jewel Case, was the first installment of Fowler’s take on personally shaky subjects of success versus failure, suicide, relationships, music, and politics, thus creating a “record as a map.”

This one-way mapped-out conversation has a DIY punk ethic, but is the antithesis of the punk song, where the goal is to shove a viewpoint in the listener’s face. Rather, Fowler’s “songs” are comprised of him gently and frustratingly searching for a viewpoint, and if you care to listen to him find one, that’s okay by him. According to him the pop song is a “conduit,” so he’s using it “to give out feeling in a compact form.” To really understand Fowler’s idea of a conduit is to literally hear it. His latest album, Summary, is merely a peek inside its creator’s head; it offers nothing less, promises nothing more. Like it, or don’t like it.