Family Average: 3/7

Howdy there folks. Time to take a trip out to the desert, and what better to keep you company than this band. Desert companion is a two piece group made up of Jennifer Wong-Wielin and Tim Hicks hailing from the land they call Nevada. Lets see what the family had to say about their self titled album…

Listen along on Spotify and read on to find out:

This Las Vegas duo pulled off a little beaut for their debut. Sweet and melodic, it and gives me those warm and fuzzy feels. It’s laid back and atmospheric, but doesn’t succumb to a forgettable white noise. They’ve developed a pretty distinct sound for themselves, creating crescendos with ethereal vocals, layers of textured guitar, and violin accents -- I’m always up for some well-done strings. That being said, it’s all just a bit too pretty. They have an EP in the works, so I’d like to see them push a bit further and bring in more of a punch. It’s a really lovely listen, but I feel like they’ve just scratched the surface.

5/7

Well hello there. I remember I used to have the typeface they used in their album cover. Heh always kind of liked it but never had a practical use for it. In this instance I think it sits well. Enough about the look of this puppy let’s talk about its bark. For the majority of the album I was content bopping my head to the slow mournful sounding songs. This is the kind of stuff I like driving, and bitter. That being said there are some heavy “alt-rock” vibes coming from a lot of the songs on this album. A lot of people have different definitions and names for different genres, but for me the sound on the track “Imperfect” fits the bill for alt-rock (maybe even nu-metal). This was the stuff on the album that kinda made me apprehensive. Honestly it's just that chugging guitar sound, makes me think of evanescence. Thankfully these moments were few and far between. Of course I am not saying this is the wrong way to make music or anything, on the contrary the style does flex a great amount of precision and quality mixing, it's just really not my cup of tea. Okay some more positives, loved the singer on this album, she owns that drony ethereal sound found in bands like Asobi Seksu, and Alcoholic Faith Mission. I also want to give a big shout out to the percussion on this album. Between the crisp sound of the ride, the thundering bass driving bass, and the touch of a tiny sounding drum machine gosh what a great collection. All and all I would take this little diddy out in the desert and stare at the sky for a couple of hours.

5/7

I find myself saying this a lot and I am starting to think that I am going crazy but I am going to say it again, I hope you are listening. Just because you have enough songs recorded to publish an album, there is no reason why you should. I enjoyed the opening two songs, except for the 5 seconds of silence in the beginning of the first song. What was up with that? I turned my monitors all the way up just to try to listen of anything was actually playing. It wasn’t. Sure that's pretty lame thing to complain about but in my professional opinion don’t say fuck you to the listener on the first song of your self titled album. As for the feel of this album I think there is some great potential that can be found here. Sadly at times, as you get towards the end of the album, the music seems like repeats of earlier tracks; everything seems strung out and the odd reverb from the lead vocals becomes stale. I had trouble finishing this album. I feel like you are sad and I got that from the first song.

3/7

Just because you have enough songs recorded to publish an album, there is no reason why you should.
don’t say fuck you to the listener on the first song of your self titled album.

This would not make a good companion if I was stuck in the desert, especially if I had to keep myself from descending into MADNESS. No no no. For real I did enjoy a few of these. It was interesting, a sound I hadn't quite heard before and couldn't completely place. I was a fan of "The Space" and "Swing". Definitely some experiments with sound that went right there. As we made our way onto the remaining tracks I was left with less surprises and more of the same. I think this album could have been about half the length and I would have enjoyed it twice as much. Some of the songs just started to drone on.

3/7

They are very talented musicians for sure.  There is a lot going on instrumentally in all the songs.  I looked them up and all of this is done by two people! I definitely appreciate their abilities. It is as though they are creating a much larger work, like a symphony, with each track.  However, again not something that appealed to me. At times there was almost too much going on and it became hard to follow where the song was going. I think sometimes artists try to include to much because they like so many instruments, genre's etc. but all too often it doesn't work out.  If they tried less layers or collaborated with other artists next time that might make them have a little more mass appeal. I give them a

4/7

Desert Companion - Very Trippy music with dreamlike qualities. Here's the disclaimer, i never really like music that was produced in a bedroom with one or two people using lots of fancy equipment. I was weaned on rock and roll, really ugly loud stuff that our parents hated and labeled as noise really terrible noise played by freaks and weirdos. So coming from that place this dreamy stuff does not appeal to me but I can appreciate it, on a certain level and the singer had a great voice, just not my cup of tea. After bashing them a bit i'd have to say that my favorite track was "Demons" it was really trippy in a 'Pink Floyd" type of way, I kept expecting to hear "welcome to the machine", but instead I just got "Welcome"  to be truthful most of the other tracks kinda put me to sleep, I think this music would do well on a long flight it was very relaxing almost too relaxing, it was easy to zone out and forget that you were listening. I am truly sorry that I did not like this more I do wish them well, as they say, " a dream you dream alone is just a dream but one you dream together becomes a reality”.

2/6