If It's Too Loud...

Hotel Ten Eyes are the rare band I wanted to see before I heard any of their music. The band first formed in December, and four months later embarked on their first tour. When I first became aware of them, they were a Nashville based four piece featuring Joe Fletcher and Ron Gallo, who are two of my recent favorites. Once I saw they were playing the ultra tiny Fort Foreclosure in Warren, RI, I knew I had to go. The first thing I noticed when Hotel Ten Eyes took the stage was that Ron Gallo wasn't with them, and they are now a three piece and Ron Gallo wasn't with them. (Their Facebook about section states that the band is "Joe Fletcher + a revolving cast of wandering spirits.") It was a bit disappointing, but I do really enjoy Joe Fletcher so I quickly got over it. For this outing, Hotel Ten Eyes was Fletcher, Scott Pittman (who has played drums with Fletcher in the past), and Annie Dolan on bass. Fletcher made the right call by choosing a side project name for Ho...

As much as I always liked Joe Fletcher & The Wrong Reasons, I never quite got why people were completely obsessed with the band. On his first solo record, You've Got the Wrong Man , I found out why. Recorded as Fletcher moved from Rhode Island to Tennessee via Georgia, it's a striking four track home recording. It's lo-fi, raw, and gritty, while being as lush and full as a mostly acoustic solo singer-songwriter can get. In a world where Mumford & Sons are folk and Taylor Swift is/was country, this brings back a level of authenticity the mainstream versions of those genres are severely lacking. It's almost corny to compare artists to Hank Williams or Johnny Cash at this point, but those are the direct forefathers to You've Got the Wrong Man.

You've Got the Wrong Man  might be the best album you'll hear all year. While I've always appreciated Joe Fletcher as an artist, I've never quite been a fan. This album changes it all, and has make me the most gushing, obsessive fan possible. The album was self-recorded on a 4 track, first at his home in Warren, RI, then a farmhouse in Georgia, and finally at Fletcher's new home in East Nashville, TN. The majority of the album features only his voice and guitar. The effect is something that sounds so gritty, raw, and lo-fi in the best possible way. It feels more like you're hearing him play in the corner of some smokey not quite up to code dive bar for maybe 7 people who are just there to drink.  It's an album of murder ballads, shanties, and songs of love lost that's closer to Johnny Cash and Hank Williams than anything else in decades. The most recent album that has this feel is Nebraska . Yes, that is absurdly high praise, but it's far past ...