Avery Hellman possesses an affable alto that’s quirky, as is the angle from which Hellman writes.
“Sitting alone on the porch I believe / Concerning the issues we washed down the sink,” goes one couplet.
Hellman, whose grandfather based the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass pageant, is the agricultural California singer-songwriter behind the musical moniker ISMAY and the brand new album “Desert Pavement,” a charming set with indeterminate antecedents.
Hellman and producer/multi-instrumentalist Andrew Marlin create wealthy colours and hazy atmospherics in a candy and savory combine. Fetching melodies are the type one would possibly whistle, and on “Stranger within the Barn,” Marlin does.
Disembodied backing vocals dart out and in, tough fingerpicking patterns on guitar present syncopation and drums reverberate as if they’re inside drums themselves. The result’s principally acoustic music that sounds good loud.
Animals, nature and farm life are recurring topics. On “The Ohio,” Hellman sings of desert cracks, wild winds and the tug of a river. “Coyote within the Street” considers the encounter from each factors of view, whereas “The Shearer & the Darby Ram” spins a story from British lore.
Subjects elsewhere embody household skeletons, home dysfunction, empathy, decency and creativity.
“My pathway to others,” Hellman sings “is paved out in data.”
And this report is an inviting pathway to ISMAY.
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