“A & B Sides Vol. Two” is the latest release by Everything But The Everything, a music outlet of Israel Chavarin AKA Izzy The Gent, a prolific multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and artist based in Oakland, California. Consisting of two excellent songs, it’s a first piece of work this year serving as an adequate follow-up of the first edition of “A & B Sides,” which included epic tracks like “We Want More” and “Open Your Mind.” For those stumbling upon a music project for the first time, Everything But The Everything combined many different but complementary music genres to illustrate such rich and luxurious sonic imagery. Perhaps post-punk comes to mind first, but you’ll notice how some of the finest properties borrowed from goth rock, dark wave, alternative, indie rock, and post-rock found their way into this sonic equation. Everything But The Everything uses all these additional elements as more than necessary enhancements, accentuations, decorations, and other details to uplift these songs to new heights while remaining loyal to the primary sonic direction. Therefore, these experimentations with many different but complementary music styles resulted in two exceptional compositions that will immediately resonate with longtime post-punk fans and beyond.
As soon as you press play, you’ll notice how Izzy The Gent thoroughly planned everything while writing, composing, arranging, recording, and producing these tracks. Each song arrives with a perfect structure, garnered with many intricate segments, brilliant ideas, and outstanding orchestrations. With Sophia Prise’s excellent vocal performance present on both songs “Hotshot” and “Salt,” this material shines even brighter. Her impressive vocal range seamlessly balances low, mid, and high notes with precision and finesse while commanding attention and guiding the listening apparatus through every segment of the song. These vocal maneuvers are especially notable on “Hotshot,” the first track of this EP. Her marvelous vocal harmonies emphasize all the segments and instrumentations, making this song even more pleasant to the ears. In the meantime, Izzy The Gent offers a comprehensive collection of wisely assembled instrumentations. You’ll notice how the tastefully composed interplay between rhythm and lead guitar serves as the perfect backdrop for all the vocals to shine upon. The catchy, memorable, engaging chord progressions resonate on one side while the other shines with marvelous leads, themes, melodies, harmonies, and other virtuosities. Of course, Izzy also thought about the rhythm section, so you’ll hear how the equally intricate, vividly hearable, warm-sounding basslines rumble beneath the guitar layers, offering more than necessary heaviness, clarity, and depth while binding guitar works with drums. The moderate, well-accentuated beats, breaks, fills, and other percussive acrobatics keep all these instrumentations in line while dictating groove and tempo, making this epic track even more detailed. Izzy The Gent’s and Sophia Prise’s creativity, talent, knowledge, and experience shine here, as they provide one of the best performances you’ll hear in a while.
“Salt” is coming up next, a perfect song that channels strong early eighties goth rock and post-punk vibes. Of course, there are some experimentations with indie and alternative rock elements, but Everything But The Everything uses these additional sonic ingredients more as decorations during particular moments. This song is a sheer example of Izzy The Gent’s creativity and brilliance. He never ceases to amaze with multilayered instrumentations that go beyond comprehension so many times throughout the entire track. Once again, Sophia Price offers a fascinating performance with her impressively clean voice, keeping the listener engaged from scratch to finish. From melodic clean singing to high-pitched shouts, she’s a definitive centerpiece of this composition. Izzy The Gent incorporated raw, abrasive, fuzzy, heavily distorted riffs on one side while the other showcases reverby, clean, memorable leads and themes. This contrast works to the song’s advantage, making it more challenging and complex. Of course, there are also semi-distorted low-ends lurking around, giving even more rawness and aggression to the song while the energetic drumming propels this track to new heights. All these instrumentations shape a dark ambiance where each vocal, sonic, and rhythmic maneuver commands attention. The incorporations of so many goth-rock and post-punk elements will unquestionably appeal to all the die-hard fans of these longevious music genres but it will also appeal to the newcomers. It’s an incredible song that flawlessly matches the melodic properties of the “Hotshot.”
As I said before, Everything But The Everything never ceases to amaze. With these two tracks, Izzy The Gent and Sophia Prise showcase decades of experience, knowledge, creativity, and talent. From the initial notes and beats, you’ll notice they poured heart and soul into this material, and their collective effort resulted in a cleverly assembled and flawlessly performed EP worth repeating over and again. From impressive vocal performance and mesmerizing guitar works to intricate low-ends and energetic drumming, “A & B Sides Vol. Two” is fully stocked with everything you ever needed from post-punk music. You should put this excellent EP on your radar as soon as possible. Don’t miss it!
Thoughts Words Action 