Bruno Major’s 2020 album To Let a Good Thing Die is a fascinating listen, because it sounds simultaneously old and new.

The style isn’t a throwback in the same way that the Menahan Street Band is a throwback, where everything about the recording process is meant to sound like something out of the analog age. It’s also not the same as Carsie Blanton doing a straight-up cover of a standard, or Charles Bradley, whose voice sounds like it might have been recovered from a magical 1960s soul time capsule.

But it’s still a throwback. Major’s songs are catchy, tightly structured, playful yet emotionally touching, and there’s something vaguely familiar about them. It’s as if someone found a stack of unpublished Gershwin songs and re-did the instrumentation so that it would appeal to listeners of lo-fi, and then sang them in an Eilish-like whisper as opposed to a Broadway belt.

What makes this a beautiful song:

1. The main melody appears on the piano before being mimicked by the voice in the first verse. This drills the very hummable tune into the listener’s head even more.

2. The lyrics are terribly sad – the singer seems to have only just realized that the woman who broke his heart isn’t coming back – but the melody and generally laid-back nature of the instrumental is so at odds with that story that you can’t help but feel happy for the guy.

3. The fantastic little chromatic descending barbershop moment at 2:37 on the line “make you change your miiiiind.”

Recommended listening activity:

Writing a pen-and-paper love letter.

Spotify.

The post Week 796: “Regent’s Park” by Bruno Major appeared first on Beautiful Song Of The Week.