Sunday, August 24, 2008
A+E, Music, Reviews

MATT PRYOR

“CONFIDENCE MAN” (VAGRANT)

   Confidence man? More like Renaissance man. Matt Pryor, already busy fronting the Get Up Kids, its offshoot the New Amsterdams and even a children’s project (the Terrible Twos), expands his horizons for this first solo release.
  
Anytime an artist writes, produces and plays all the instruments on an album, there’s going to be a fair amount of insular navel-gazing. Pryor goes the folk route here, pulling back his voice for subtle, introspective tunes that generally hit the sweet spot. 

The acoustic songs, most of them stripped down to just guitar, skeletal bass, occasional harmonica and light percussion, fall heavy on the lyrical side, with the melodies almost an afterthought. Pryor has a lovely voice, smooth but not overly mellow, which entices the listener as he sings about “On How Our Paths Differ,” “When the World Stops Turning” and being your “Confidence Man” with charm and grace.
   

At 15 tracks, Pryor spreads himself a bit thin, but nothing is longer than four minutes, and most tunes clock in at under three. At any point, you half expect him to break into “Hey There Delilah,” since, like that freak Plain White T’s hit, this material resonates with unforced sensitivity. Pryor displays a commitment to a folk style that’s new to him, and while some of the set drifts away into doe-eyed wispiness and isn’t all memorable, it seems he thinks it is. And by believing in himself he makes us believe too. That’s the attribute of any good folkie. 3 STARS—Hal Horowitz