Maine news, sports, weather from Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland, Maine

Local CD Review

MIKE OLCOTT

— By

click image to enlarge

Select images available for purchase in the
Maine Today Photo Store

Things are going to start moving a lot faster around Bath-based singer-songwriter Zach Hurd now that he's crafted his soulful debut, ''Changing Landscapes.''

These nine tunes have a certain swagger; it's not cockiness, just a hard-won assertion that it's time to be noticed. As the title implies, it is an effort that is bound to carry its author well outside our cold little corner of the world.

On the opener, ''Strange,'' over an urgent snare drum and shaker combo, ghostly harmonies open up just enough into a glorious chorus. ''Just enough'' is the theme throughout, and it's Hurd's instinctive restraint that makes this song list purr. That the organs, guitars and drums are perfectly on is an afterthought. As a vocalist, Hurd is a less-is-more assassin.

The highlight (among many) is the '70s lounger ''Do Your Thing.'' There's no way to convey how good this song is; you just have to listen to Hurd do it like Donny Hathaway in his prime. If you poke your ears in close enough, you'll hear a stomp-and-clap beat as in Coldplay's ''Lost,'' just slower and smoother. With silken syntax, a candy groove and a group of virtuosos in the room as far behind the beat as possible, throw the lights down, play this song for your lover and see what happens.

It's clear on the rest of the album that this experimental-acoustic-pop artist has ''it.'' Hurd the songwriter knows the dynamics of a proper pop song; Hurd the producer has a hefty bag of tricks for setting the mood. The ''experimental'' piece could use some more careful editing (sometimes the theremin--like whines in the background pollute a perfectly good song), but Hurd has bought himself enough time to solve that trifle for next time.

Brooklyn, where Hurd now lives and writes, is obviously a much bigger pond, and the polish on the record shows an awareness that the stakes are high. The decisions are bigger and the financial and creative risks are greater, so if your stuff isn't good enough, you're out, and that's it.

Neither the record nor the artist seems too fazed. Deft finger-picking is the only adornment used on the closer, ''When I Go.'' As with the rest of ''Changing Landscapes,'' Hurd is vocally bearing these songs from the inside, not trying to perform them exactly, just figuring out how to let them out. Y'Hurd?

Mike Olcott is a freelance writer who lives in Portland.