Review Summary: The tragedy of Ryan Star
Ryan Star seems akin to more of a reaction than to a musician. A proverbial piece of clay which the music industry has molded to create just their patent of bland. And bland he has become, along with cliche, tiresome, generic, and pretty much ready to be put on wholesale with his identical counterparts Nickelback, Lifehouse,Three Days Grace, Switchfoot,etc. etc. etc. What makes Ryan Star so interesting though, is not that his music has become so cardboard that you could literally cut it out and give it to your kids to make lanterns, birdhouses, ornaments, crossbows and other popular home made accessaries, but rather that, several years ago, he was threatening to become much more than just a popular trope. To be exact, he was threatening to become great. "Songs From The Eye Of An Elephant" is Ryan Star's most overlooked statement, it's also the only one that means anything.
"Songs From The Eye Of An Elephant" doesn't feature any of the expansive studio production that his latest album features, instead it replaces it with the forgotten ingredient of soul, and it rarely comes of as so potent. "Eye Of An Elephant" was mostly recorded in Star's living room, which means the majority of these songs feature only a Grand piano, or a beautifully hollowed out guitar. Less than half even feature percussion, and occasionally Ryan Star adds strings in the background to hit that well guarded emotional sweet spot, a spot he's missed ever since (hopefully his sex life hasn't become so misaligned.)
Ryan Star's voice is reminiscent of Phil Collins, except ridiculously melodramatic integrated with a vibrant essence of erotic grittiness, and it's nothing at all really like Phil Collins. But whatever awkward descriptions you paint his voice with, it's hard to deny how explosive it can be. "We Might Fall" slowly escalates from a soft simmer of a song, to a highly emotional sucker-punch, with Star wailing into the microphones, seemingly playing the piano so hard that keys seem to be in danger of breaking in half. While it's true he recreates this formula countless times throughout the album, it rarely loses it's effect. Star seems accidentally at home with the bare minimalism and raw atmosphere. Even "Back Of Your Car", his originally highly distorted apocalyptic hook-fest, is several times more effective with delicate piano and the slow murmur of drums.
Ryan Star seems to put so much of himself into this record you can't help but make it personal. It's as if your there watching him, sitting on his mahogany couch, as he plays for no one but himself. There is a heart stopping moment in "Saw You In Heaven" where after an intense chorus, the song drifts into silence, and for a brief moment you hear the man actually sigh. At the end of "Famous Yet" a bittersweet, but especially sweet, ballad, you can hear him put his guitar down on the ground and rise off his chair (or whatever the hell he was sitting on.) Sure these are small insignificant ingredients in a much larger musical landscape but it's nuances like these that make the record as resonating as it is.
Unfortunately, for every great song there is a let-down, and at 20 songs, the album is at least 25 minutes too long. And as much as you would like to deny it, the ***ty cliche rock singer is always present somewhere in this album. "So Ordinary" features a moral so vomit-inducing it (all that you need, is all that you are) it could be destined to be Katy Perry's next feel-good single. "Waiting For Love" not only uses such an already worn down formula that it's unbearable, but it also probably got that formula's answer wrong, and "The One You Know" is the worst R.E.M cover that the world has ever seen. Yet it is a special circumstance when Star hits the right notes. "Dance With You" has one of the most intense bridges I have every experienced, with Stars anguished cry turning into a hard scream. "Sink Or Swim" is breathtakingly romantic, and "Lullaby Suicide" is incredibly affecting, as odd as the lullaby is.
Ryan Star always seemed destined for commercialism, which makes "Songs From The Eye Of An Elephant" endearingly ironic, as it is the complete anti-thesis to everything that commercialism is. A stripped down, scattered yet emotional set of songs which feel as real as they do profound. While it's true many artist's have done this brand of album to a much more successful degree (Ryan Star never comes close to touching Elliot Smith for example) "Eye Of An Elephant" showcases a talent and potential brighter than most artist can dream of. Star will most likely be forgotten as one of the many mainstream pop musicians of the 21st century, but he'll be one of the few who had a chance to be something more.
