HAY UN CUERPO TIRADOEN LA CALLE,
FRANNY GLASS
Contrapedal, Uruguay
Rating: 72
By Carlos Reyes
This is the first Uruguayan album we ever reviewed, well, not really, there’s a review for Mar Dulce somewhere around but besides that, we hadn’t had the chance to look deep into the scene until a couple of weeks ago that prolific producer Juan Campodonico hooked us up with a very cool label called Contrapedal. It’s great to open another channel to discover, because of course, there’s more to Uruguayan pop than El Cuarteto de Nos, Bajofondo, Erik Couts and Jorge Drexler. Franny Glass is a fantastic way to start filling the gap; this is a one-man show by Gonzalo Deniz whose eloquent creations are closer to a story-teller than a singer, Hay Un Cuerpo Tirado En La Calle is his second album.
Right from the start one feels a seamless construction of camp-like fire songs attached to strings, it’s folk and pop and country. Franny Glass’s articulation also reminds me of Spain’s Sr. Chinarro and Francisco Nixon, they all stand on the verge of cantautores and trovadores, this explains the hard time outsiders have with their music and why the people around them embrace them as they’re very own. Take the first single “Hoy no quiero verte nunca más”, its elite is implused by circled travelling instead of melody, in part because there is little instrument intervention, leaving the man restore his faith by discharging painful memories of his broken heart.
Most of the album is down there, chants about desolation or to be exact, 13 songs of despair and “Protegiendome del Sol”, one that is sort of sad but very uplifting. This piece is so painful and at the same time very beautiful, an inconsolable brokenhearted individual protects himself from the sun by not going out, deciding instead to heal by listening to records, if unsuccessful, it might just be time to bring the sun down interminably; ok, I lied not exactly uplifting but at least it gives pain some closure. There are some lighter sing-along tracks like “Abro Los Ojos” and “Quedate Un Rato”, cautionary victims of living life under routine but conforming to some standards, very respectful in my book. There are too many spare songs here and not enough variation among them, but I guess we can’t get enough songs about love and its details.