(2022) Alex Izenberg - I'm Not Here  


Review:
On his first two albums, Harlequin (2016) and Caravan Château (2020), Los Angeles musician Alex Izenberg looked inward, expressly using music to work through the anxieties and self-consciousness that accompanied a paranoid schizophrenia diagnosis just a few years before his debut. Still basking in an eccentric, ’70s-evoking chamber pop, his third album, I’m Not Here, finds the musician looking to the writings of Alan Watts on the subject of personas for some of its inspiration, including the quote “You’re under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago.” Featuring the image of a mask on its cover, I’m Not Here is also distinctly personal in nature, with Izenberg grappling with heartache, absurdity, and grief, the latter resulting from the death of his cherished dog, Larks. Larks was named after Larks’ Tongues in Aspic, the 1973 album by one of the songwriter’s primary influences, King Crimson, whose influence can be heard here alongside songwriters like Harry Nilsson and John Lennon, among others. Having said that, Izenberg’s idiosyncratically druggy, dreamy, mostly acoustic pop overshadows any specific inspirations, even on a track like “Broadway,” which incorporates Bach-like keyboard runs. They’re sometimes doubled by strings, creating a pulsating, wave-like motion beneath weary double-tracked vocals. The generally lush set of contemplations reunites Izenberg with Caravan Château co-producer Greg Hartunian and features string and woodwind arrangements by Dirty Projector’s Dave Longstreth. Speaking of woodwinds, the brighter, tightly harmonized “Gemini Underwater” adds flute and lead electric guitar to the album’s hazy, strummy landscapes and — in this case, literally — flowery reflections (“Like a wreath of roses wrapped upon the visions of my youth”). Elsewhere, he adopts a playful blues-rock on “Egyptian Cadillac” and theatrical piano balladry on “Juniper & Lamplight,” among other slight diversions, without ever seeming to leave the confines of his own mind.


       


Track List:
01 - Ivory
02 - Gemini Underwater
03 - Egyptian Cadillac
04 - Breathless Darkness
05 - Broadway
06 - Our Love Remains
07 - Ladies of Rodeo
08 - Sorrows Blue Tapestry
09 - Sea of Wine


Media Report:
Genre: chamber pop, indie-pop
Country: USA
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec, 16-bit PCM
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits


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