The EP sees Ryan exploring the anxieties that can be found at home in creative and effortlessly compelling fashion
With the release of his new EP The Weather’s Been Fine, Atlanta indie rock artist Ryan O’Connell does a great job of tapping into the most human and real side of his celebrated slacker rock sound, recording in his home and capturing the world that goes on around him every day and taking a piece of it into the EP with him in a way that feels honest and raw.
The EP opens with ‘Cannonball Man’, a track that has a fervent, energetic appeal to it from the moment that it starts, setting the tone for the release in emphatic fashion. Creative, Bloc Party-esque riffs meet the artist’s typically laid-back vocal style to create a thoughtful marriage of styles that feels engrossing throughout, embracing its lo-fi aesthetic and offering a level of intricacy where others would have gone for a lazier route.
This is followed by ‘Bleach Dreams’, a track that has a more brooding and atmospheric tone to it throughout while being packed full of fun rhythms and an inescapably catchy allure that grips you from the moment that the track begins and never lets up, further cementing the thoughtful and heart that the artist pours into his work.
There is a claustrophobic feel to the release as a whole, entirely by design as the artist explores the feeling of feeling over-stimulated and overwhelmed by the vastness of what goes on in his home and the eco-system around him that threatens to swallow him whole. This idea feels most pronounced on ‘Mirror Coat’, a track that has a nostalgic new-wavey aesthetic that feels dense and all-encompassing in a way that mirrors the artist’s psyche on the release.
The shoegazy ‘Peak Gold’ allows a little more room to breathe, at least initially, before once again succumbing to a wall of sound that feels like it is closing in and taking over. The lighter and softer moments on the EP only serve to make the more intense ones feel more perilous and anxiety-inducing, and it makes for a really interesting and engaging listening experience as you shift from one state to another at the artist’s will.
As the thoughtful ‘The Weather’s Been Fine’ offers a short, sub-two minute closer on the EP, it offers a moment to reflect on the EP and the genius in which it was put together. In order to truly sell the way that narrator feels at home and the way maddening way that it can feel, it has turned the limitations of his recording space (or kitchen) and turned it into one of its biggest strengths, the artist is telling you about these things while you can literally feel the impact that they are having on the sound and the way that the EP comes together, and it makes for a truly unique listening experience that leaves a memorable impression on you as a listener.
