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A.A. Bondy
American Hearts
(Fat Possum)
First Appeared in The Music Box, April 2008, Volume 15, #4
Written by John Metzger
Wed April 16, 2008, 06:30 AM CDT
After listening to American Hearts, one thing is perfectly clear: A.A.
Bondy has a tremendously tortured soul. In both his lyrics and his music, demons
and angels collide in an epic battle, and this is as much a reflection of the
forces that are at play inside him as it is of the good and evil that are at
work in the world at large. The darkness threatens to suffocate him, and more
often than not, he seems ready, willing, and able to embrace it.
Over the course of American Hearts, Bondy murders his father (How
Will You Meet Your End), offs himself (Killed Myself When I Was Young),
and slips with a lover beneath the waves of the ocean (Of the Sea). Yet,
there’s light here, too. It streams through the luminescent, finger-picked
guitar patterns that he tosses across the surface of Black Rain, Black Rain,
and it pours through the prayer for peace — or at least for a little sanity and
perspective — that serves as American Hearts’ title track. Even in the
worst of times, it seems, there exists a glimmer of hope — the first line he
sings in How Will You Meet Your End, the set’s opening track, is "I’m
going to keep that diamond in my mind" — and this dangling carrot keeps him
moving forward in his quest to find happiness and joy, wherever it may be.
American Hearts is an album that is steeped in tradition. Bondy
undeniably is a disciple of Bob Dylan, though he also knows enough to go further
back in time in order to feed his muse with ideas that were drawn from the likes
of Woody Guthrie and Rev. Gary Davis. Nevertheless, there are more contemporary
elements at work within Bondy’s material, too. The electric guitar that winds
through No Man Shall echoes the gritty, urban blues that Lou Reed
developed with the Velvet Underground, but most of all, Bondy’s voice is eerily
reminiscent of Jeff Tweedy’s. Marinated in cigarettes and whiskey, it is broken,
weary, battered, and bruised — which makes his desire to come face-to-face with
the son of God all the more believable.
Yes, it’s easy to pick Bondy’s influences out of the fray, but the sincerity
of his delivery inevitably makes his songs stick. His arrangements are stripped
to their barest essence, and for the most part, he dresses his material only in
subtle shadings and creepy effects. Both musically and lyrically, American
Hearts is emotionally honest and direct. It is a heartfelt and moving
apocalyptic vision of the modern world, and it makes such a startlingly deep
impression that anyone who happens to hear it can’t help but to view Bondy as an
important new voice on the Americana scene. 
American Hearts is available from Amazon.com.
To order, Click Here!
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Ratings
1 Star: Pitiful
2 Stars: Listenable
3 Stars: Respectable
4 Stars: Excellent
5 Stars: Can't Live Without It!!
Copyright © 2008 The Music Box
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