New Music Review: Ian Tanner - Things Never To Say Out Loud

Those of you that listen to the ObviousPopCast know him as the artist that wrote and performed the ObviousPop theme song. The rest of you need to get to know Ian Tanner. This brilliant songwriter, performer and producer is Canada's best kept musical secret. Ian is a multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter with a long career as an artist and as a studio musician. He was a founding member of a band in the 80's called The Awakening and the band One Hundred Days in the 90's. For the past 5 years he's been writing and recording his own material in between his studio and live work. He's finally releasing his first solo project, appropriately titled, Things Never To Say Out Loud. Ian's varied influences are evident and the album showcases numerous musical styles, the most prominent of which is power pop. The highlight of almost every track are the vocal arrangements and hooks. Ian's love of The Beatles and Beach Boys is in evidence, but the group I think of the most while listening is Crowded House. That probably has a lot to do with the fact that Ian's voice is similar to Neil Finn's. Then there are the lyrics. From sad songs about a tragic divorce and relationship issues, "A Broken Part of You" and "Signed, Witnessed and Delivered," to hilarious novelty songs about relationship issues "That's It, I'm Going Gay" and "Blow Me Kisses." But the best songs here are the trilogy of tunes on the first part of the record, "Ten Cartwheels," "Jade" and "Always True."

Every song here is well worth the price of admission and you can stream the entire thing on the widget below. The only negative about this release is that it is digital only, so you'll have to download it from iTunes or Amazon.

Comments

[Fathermosh]

Excellent! Will DL soon!

[MrQwerty]

This is superb. Agree the trio that opens the album are excellent. Love to investigate those earlier refs from the 80's & 90's too.