Rating: NNN
To understand Rich Aucoin, you need to take in his over-the-top live shows, which marry a DIY multimedia experience with an interactive focus that blurs the line between audience and performer. Capturing that on an audio recording is next to impossible, and when removed from that context, his tunes begin to feel like vehicles for convincing club crowds to play silly games with giant parachutes rather than serious songs. On Ephemeral, though, Aucoin is feeling more introspective than usual, which gives his electro-bubblegum sound a slightly more emotionally weighty undercurrent.
Years of living on the road have made the artist miss seeing his old friends in the flesh, but that wistful melancholy is mostly hidden under singalong choruses and distorted synth riffs. Songs about feeling homesick shouldn’t feel like rock anthems, but so much of Aucoin’s identity is based on his live persona that he can’t seem to escape writing for that setting. Nevertheless, the slightly more sombre edge of the new material should help make his future performances more nuanced.
Top track: City I Love
