Album Review : Cory Branan : Mutt

Feb 8, 2013 Album Reviews
Posted by Adam

This may be the most overdue review I have ever done, as Cory Branan dropped this gem of a record on us last May. While many of you have probably already bought or heard about Mutt, I felt I needed to at least address it quickly because it was my favorite record of 2012.

It had been 6 years since Branan had released a record, and subsequently he had fallen out of my mind when this album showed up. I had it for a couple of weeks before I even ventured to listen to it, but when I did I was completely blown away. Branan has completely delivered on the promise that was present on his first two releases.

Mutt seems to come from every direction, with no real sense as to what Branan is made of, thus, making the title perfect. Branan seems at home writing and singing folky ballads, balls out rockers and everything in between. Regardless of the particular sound of a song, Branan’s songwriting ability is the star of this record. Over and over again, I found myself rewinding a song to hear specific lyrics.

This record has helped pushed me further into the “hey have you heard of…”, annoying music nerd realm and you know what? I’m perfectly fine with that as long as more people hear this one. It’s been out nearly a year and still I am finding myself listening to it a couple times a week.

My favorites on this one start off with “Bad Man”, where the singer proclaims he is the song’s title and the girl of his desire should not only accept this fact, but embrace it fully because a bad man is just what she needs. Further along in the album is “Yesterday” a song that reminisces about a teenage love set in the eighties and includes a verse about the power of scent association that is great.

The last song I want to mention is on the record twice. “Survivor Blues” first shows up on the album as punk influenced rocker, that takes the troubled man meets the broken-hearted girl story to a brand new level. Having not looked at the track listing before my first listen, I was thinking how great this song would be slowed down and acoustic. Much to my delight, the album closes with the after hours version of the song, which I prefer. The slower version really allows the lyric to shine on this one and they are great, see below.

She struggled to read his knuckle tattoos
Beneath the ring and the scar
But the left said love and the right read true
She said please say you got a car

It’s parked out back
It’s pointed out of state
It’s a recent acquisition we should probably ditch the plates

And it won’t get you far enough to ever lose track
But yeah it’s plenty car enough for never coming back

They say it makes it stronger
But first you gotta survive
What didn’t kill you will make you wish you died
What didn’t kill you will make you wish you died

If you don’t already own Mutt, please do yourself a favor and skip over to Cory Branan’s website and get a copy, it is my biggest recommendation from the past year.

Some notes about Broken Jukebox, look for a few new things on here in the near future, be looking out for free cd giveaways and new writers and all kinds of other things.

Tags: album reveiw, cory branan