Singer-songwriter Alex Stoitsiadis was supposed to be hollering his hooks over melodic post-hardcore guitars in roiling 250-cap clubs, and the scenes of heartbreak he described were supposed to be playing out for listeners in real life.
Listen/Buy: Rough Trade | Apple Music | Spotify | TidalĪ band’s impact shouldn’t be hypothetical, but here’s Dogleg, the debutants of Michigan emo, whose breakout year mostly took place in the imagination.
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Letter to You’s familiar sound dovetails elegantly with its subject matter, in which every present moment carries the full weight of the past. Not every song is so topical, but all are similarly burdened by history. “Rainmaker,” a resurrected anthem about a leader whose charismatic deceptions win over a desperate populace, somehow predates the Trump administration-a reminder that our stormy era is not an aberration, but a culmination. “Last Man Standing” describes a musician packing up his instrument alone onstage at the end of the night, a poignant metaphor for the twilight of a performer’s career. He basks in the band’s jubilant orchestrations, but also uses them toward more complicated ends. Mixing gritty rock with high drama, in arrangements packed with organ, guitar, and soaring tenor sax, Letter to You feels more like a classic-era E Street Band record than anything Bruce Springsteen has released in at least a decade. Columbia Bruce Springsteen: Letter to You