April Smith and her old-timey cadre rolled through Brooklyn Bowl on Friday night, promoting their nascent album Songs for a Sinking Ship. Smith's band mates donned ties, vests, and Gatsby hats to float their saloon sound comprised of bass, guitar, drums, and a rotation of accordion, violin, ukulele, tambourine, and suitcase. The new album title is unfortunately apt; the tunes are succinct enough for a pre-submersion rendition, and formulaic enough to slip below the surface without causing a ripple.
Smith set the tone early, with the one-two punch of the up-beat "Movie Loves A Screen" and "Drop Dead Gorgeous." It was immediately apparent that her powerful voice was a sparkling pearl amidst the Vaudevillian barnacles. Sweet, brilliant vocal riffs of the album were replicated effortlessly. She slammed and sustained notes at the top of her impressive upper-register. At her best, Smith sounded like the Gwen Stefani of the early No Doubt days; fresh and sassy, with a trail of tight vibrato at the finish.
As the set ambled along, its momentum started to wane. Three-minute ditty here, offer to adopt a two-year-old Persian cat there. Smith's drummer smiled goofily as he and an upright bassist contributed the rhythm section to the melange of honky-tonk accoutrements. After a slow ballad and an ode to a "Dixie Boy," it occurred to me that this wasn't your typical mid-show lull - it was quite simply a shortage of compelling music. As the performance progressed, the outfits seemed more like costumes and the concert more like a gimmick. Smith continued to shine vocally, but when all was said and done, her talent had overshadowed the songwriting.
At the end of the day, April Smith's music is a pastiche of a bygone era. It's fun to relive for a few moments, but there's very little pushing of the envelope. Perhaps it was especially apparent betwixt the decrepit warehouses of Williamsburg that an act the ilk of April Smith requires more edge than the playful "bitch, please" tag at the end of "Stop Wondering" to attain any measure of street cred. There's something to be said about revamping the framework of a familiar style. But the hole in this particular vessel is larger than Smith's vocal prowess can plug.
