ALBUM REVIEW: Dramamine, by Bailey Minzenberger
Dramamine, the new album from multi-instrumentalist Bailey Minzenberger, declares itself immediately. The minimal, slightly modulated opening guitar gives an impression of simplicity, but then Bailey pulls melody out of their guitar like a weaver pulls color into a loom. I’d apologize for that wide-eyed metaphor, but the image of a loom or a harp came to mind several times throughout the album — something about the way Bailey constructs melodies that play with my expectations of phrasing — and the result is a album like nothing I’ve ever heard.
I mean, really go back and listen to One, the haunting opening song. Bailey creates atmosphere, layered with a breathing pad of sound beneath a complex and beautiful guitar line that seems to roll onto itself as it circles overhead. This is mirrored in the lyrics — stark and evocative, but delivered with a calm that only intensifies their impact:
“But I’ll wait outside your door
caress cold tile and drag my weight across the floor
rest my eyes, chip my teeth on February skies
I’ll lie”
We’re only one song in and I’m having trouble not just replaying One.
If you think you have the album pigeonholed at this point, you’re wrong, though the opening of Rosemary won’t immediately contradict you. Instead it’s the end, where after what feels like a deep breath, the texture suddenly changes as heavily distorted guitar lines fade in. This is indicative of one of Bailey’s real strengths as a songwriter — they have a keen sense of texture, which allows the album to constantly defy comparison. Even the baseline guitar sound, which many artists would allow to remain consistent throughout, changes radically from the gorgeous modulation in One to the vibrant ‘clean-electric’ sound in Rosemary, to the muted acoustic guitar in brief but beautiful Maurice.
I need talk about Outlier, though. It’s a cousin of Rosemary, but it lives in a whole different world. Outlier, perhaps more than any other song on the album, will let you believe in its simplicity for a moment. It’s not until after the first chorus that Bailey pulls the rug, but when they do, it’s one of the best one-two punches I’ve ever heard — first an arpeggio that can only be described as shredding, and then, when you expect the arpeggio again, a stunning syncopated jazz riff that lifts the song into another dimension. By the end, when the feedback of a distorted guitar and mathy drums take over, it’s hard to remember where we even started. Bailey, who played every instrument on the album, is a phenomenal drummer, and Outlier is full of understated testaments to their skill.
Perhaps one of the most interesting choices Bailey makes on the album is in closing it with two instrumental tracks (it feels meaningful that these songs come after the title track, which includes the lyric: “But who am I writing for? I don’t know,” and which also ends with an extended instrumental exploration of its own melodic themes). The first, Deming, is a tremulous atmosphere made of rich layers of chords that fade into each other and eventually out. The last song, Pat, starts by exploring similar chordal sweeps, but soon builds, guided by another sensitive and powerful drum performance, into something completely different. First it’s a meditative guitar solo — Bailey somehow managing to keep the focus on the way the sounds die even as they build more and more complexity into the melodies, and finally, introduced by some newly pointed hits on the drum, the chord melodies take over and the song circles through its own melodies until it too fades.
What more is there to say? Lyrically, the album is full of poetry. Bailey’s vocal performance is calm but emotive- in fact, their voice is uniquely suited for layers, whether based in harmonies or doubled melodies, and they use both of these to refine the textures in the music. Bailey keeps the music grounded, which allows their more complex ideas to shine. Little moments like the repeating guitar run in One (I’m obsessed, I know), to the rhythmic complexities in Outlier and Pat, to the way the drums splash into Clary Sage after the first chorus (holy shit, how have I not mentioned Clary Sage!? It’s marvelous) — Bailey is so good at building atmosphere and expectations, and then subverting those expectations beautifully.
Dramamine, by Bailey Minzenberger, is out now on all platforms, but Bandcamp is the only one that lets you pay the artist directly. Look out for shows here. Many thanks to Bailey for making beautiful art and inspiring me to write something after at least a year.
