Mikal Cronin, Mikal Cronin.
Charlie and the Moonhearts are the best band not from Rhode island to have uncovered the sandy cave where the beach boys meet the Ramones. (The one from Rhode island would be the Queers.)
The bassist of the Moonhearts is intermittently solo, getting produced by the band’s drummer Ty Segall, with the third Moonheart, Charlie Moonheart himself, providing a guitar solo on “Green & Blue.” The sound in consciously less harmonic or clattery than C&TM but with a similar smoothed-out sandpaper sensibility. It’s got that echoey, dispossessed thing happening, but at a frenzied clip that swooshes you along in much the way the Moonhearts do. For a one-man effort, it’s impressively layered, and loaded with gentle personality. Hearing Beach Boys harmonies deconstruct into raw Arch Hall Jr.-level rock frolics before your very ears, as it does on the album-opening “Is It Alright,” is a delirious experience even before the woodwinds break into the mix.
Folky starts get power-chord endings (“Apathy”). Feedbacky beginning go blissfully psychedelic (“Green and Blue”). Quiet, glistening tinkles become strum floods (“Gone”). The vocabulary is kept simple, so it all works. The far flung influences are joined smartly by swooping vocals, catchy melodies and beats so fast you don’t question, you just follow.
Simple and direct on the face of it, I’ve so far been unable to hear this album the same way twice. It comes at me from new directions with every listen. You know how the Beach Boys’ “Be True to Your School” has sweet harmonies collide with a cheerleading section? Mikal Cronin imagines the sports field, and tailgating, and the loners smoking under the bleachers as well.