Summertime is a malleable and ever-changing thing.
It’s not just a season defined by heat and vacations, it’s a concept – maybe even a mindset – that represents an annual opportunity to claim what we need and enjoy it for a couple of months.
Some summers, that means wild, high-energy dance anthems for when we need parties and a sense of community. Sometimes, it’s all about protest songs and rallying cries for the summers when we need organization or solidarity.
But if there’s one thing we all need this summer, it’s surely simplicity.
With the increasing flurry of technology and distraction and the rapid, daily pace of news (most of it bad), it’s safe to say that we could all use a little “simple” right now, something reassuringly familiar or comfortably catchy to provide the score to a summer of slowing down.
Well, if that sounds like what you need for your own seasonal soundtrack, some OKC locals have you covered with their newest short-form releases, offering the kind of comforting, earworming folk and indie jams that’ll have you slowing down to smell the flowers and keep you humming all summer.
Gabee Rolla-Danley – ‘The Flame EP’
Though Gabee Rolla-Danley might be a newcomer to the world of acoustic singer-songwriter releases, they’re actually something of a local scene veteran already, having scored and collaborated on some award-winning indie films and Okie projects in recent years.
But on the surprise-release debut EP “The Flame” (dropped unexpectedly on streamers on May 24th), Rolla-Danley is finally staking a claim in the indie-folk world and using their voice to announce a genuine talent for deeply earnest, emotional songwriting.
“The Flame” is all about old-fashioned, straightforward love songs with no forced irony or ill-advised eye-rolling detected.
These are serious and simple songs that come simply from the heart, each compellingly fleshed out by the creatively minimalist production and accompaniment of local whiz Kyle Reid, but each anchored and grounded firmly by Rolla-Danley’s own voice. It’s a voice of youthful vulnerability and an ever-so-slightly country-tinged tonality without ever being oversold or resorting to tired Southern-twang affectations.
The stars of each and every track here are the open-hearted honesty of Rolla-Danley’s lyrics and the intriguingly subtle ways that the songs are built around and beneath them. The rolling, cyclical synth beds of “Forevers” underscore a song that is itself about the universal recurrence and cycling of love, just as an appropriately reverberating openness persists throughout “I am a Ghost.”
While so many artists in the indie-folk space are making music for foot-stomping Friday nights or Saturday campfire singalongs, “The Flame” is a collection of songs made instead for Sunday mornings, when the world slows a bit and the deepest, smallest feelings are at their biggest.
“The Flame EP” by Gabee Rolla-Danley is available on streaming services now.
Beau Jennings – ‘Doves EP’ – June 6th
Speaking of indie-folk, one of Oklahoma’s most acclaimed and inexhaustible folk songwriters, Beau Jennings, is back this month with a short collection of earnest, honest offerings of his own.
Jennings has recently been casting an insightful eye to the cultural comings and goings of his own Norman community on last year’s lauded “American Stories, Major Chords,” examining how his town fits into the wider world.
But throughout the four tracks on “Doves,” he’s turning that gaze back around to try and figure out how the world fits into him.
He’s always been a refreshingly honest songwriter, but here Jennings is openly confronting his own age, his own preoccupations, and his own history of mistakes and misplaced faiths, and how it all factors into both the rapidly changing world and his own gradually stabilizing life.
The opening title track – bolstered by the unmistakable rasp and inimitable timing and structure of Samantha Crain – is a road trip contemplation about the unexpected freedom that age brings, about no longer being bound to your own worst impulses. “Maybe change ain’t scary like I thought it was,” he sings.
And then, as if confidently running headlong into that same willful change, the track “Baby Blue” stamps in on an electronic beat and glittering synths and pianos, with Jennings’ verses punctuated by ethereal sax. It’s a welcome and sudden departure for Jennings’ sound, very “90s Springsteen,” and believe me when I say that’s a huge compliment coming from me.
The standout from the collection, though – and perhaps the thesis statement of the release – is “Second Deer.” It’s a powerful, ground-level statement of how difficult it can feel to reconcile the conflicts and confusions of the world with the steady, studied microcosm of your own life, and how easy it is to be blindsided by reality.
“Doves EP” by Beau Jennings drops June 6th.
The Nghiems – ‘El Camino EP’ – June 12th
No band in OKC is doing infectious, head-bobbing pop-rock quite as well as The Nghiems, and over the past couple of years, they’ve been dropping a handful of inescapably catchy singles to remind everyone.
Now they’re finally compiling them in a new four-track EP that focuses the production and allows their effervescent songwriting to blend between tracks and create exactly the kind of airy, head-in-the-clouds daydreaming release that we all need this summer.
The title track bursts through the door like your wacky neighbor. A big drum kickoff and gets things moving before slip-sliding through a showcase of production, with dreamy synths, chiming guitars, driving basslines, urgent, barely-contained drumming, and big-chord acoustic strums all trading time without ever breaking the flow or pace of the simple song at its heart.
Next comes “Nobody Move,” a song that’s been immovably stuck in my head since its original single release two full years ago, and one that could just as easily be the song of the summer once again.
The invitingly sing-along-ready “Stay (Na Na Na Na)” follows before setting up closer “Kpop Band,” which is presented here decidedly differently from the low-tech bop of the “Brine Webb Remix” version of the track that was dropped as a single last year.
Here, “Kpop Band” is all floating synths, blips, and bubbling leads. No longer the spur-of-the-moment plea for escape of the remix version, here it’s an idle, enjoyable daydream of running away and living happily (and famously) ever after.
“El Camino EP” by The Nghiems drops June 12th.
You can find out about local music and performance happenings in the OKC metro weekly in this music column by Brett Fieldcamp. | Brought to you by True Sky Credit Union.
Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
