Anyone who knows Julian Cubillos as a multi-instrumentalist on other people’s records – Office Culture, Alena Spanger, and Christian Lee Hutson are among the artists who’ve enlisted his services – might be pleasantly surprised to know that he makes excellent records on his own, and that his latest release is his first in seven years. The new self-titled album finds Cubillos working on a slightly smaller scale, yet with compositions and melodies that are bright, complex, and intelligent. Nearly every song sounds like a potential single.
Born in Los Angeles but based in Queens, Cubillos last released a record under his own name in 2018. In Heaven, like its predecessor, Evil (2015), employed full bands that gave Cubillos a greater palette to work with. The new record is almost entirely Cubillos, except for backing vocals from Spanger and Ivy Meissner (the latter his partner in the indie-pop outfit Little Mystery), as well as contributions from Jason Burger and Levon Henry on drums and saxophone, respectively, on one song.
This almost completely literal solo project might come off as slightly claustrophobic in someone else’s hands, but Cubillos happens to write songs that are brilliantly conceived and often catchy as hell. The acoustic guitar-led opening track, “Returning”, is a scruffy, midtempo gem that Paul McCartney might’ve tossed off during White Album sessions.
That’s immediately followed by the single “Talking to Myself”, a hip-swaying slice of irresistible funk pop (accompanied by an utterly charming music video) that brings to mind early Beck, both in the musical swagger and the up-front sneer of the lyrics (“And every other night on the astral plane / Your fuckin’ ass shows up in the pouring rain / Like a Roman god”).
That warm lo-fi funk pops up again on “Price of Guilt”, but in more of a ballad mode. The warm touches that dot the song are lovingly, yet incongruously, paired with a noisy, atonal guitar solo. However, Cubillos also brings some pleasant surprises, like the breakneck, futuristic new wave pace of “Fruit Stripe”, which sounds like Elvis Costello on a space-rock bender. The laid-back tropical lilt of “Portuguese Bend” adds another dimension, with Spanger and Meissner’s vocals lending the song an ethereal twist.
The loping power-pop of “Flesh and Blood” is another highlight, with sonic flashes of Harry Nilsson or maybe Wings at their easygoing best, and Cubillos’ experimental stabs in the guitar solo and the added instrumentation of Burger and Henry rounding out the arrangement like a perfect gem delivered right to your local 1970s AM radio station.
While the album begins with “Returning”, the final track, “Departing”, suggests a bookend of sorts. The latter track is a brief, mysterious slab of experimental gestures, field recordings, and distant, warbled song that sounds as if it’s coming from a distance or through a wall. It’s an odd way to close out a record filled with irresistible earworms, perhaps suggesting the beginning of a new, more musically curious phase? If Julian Cubillos creates experimental music as well as pop gems, we’re all in good hands.
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