Review by John Gjaltema
Alt Country NL
“The singer-songwriter J. Briozo does not really exist. It is a figure that came to life in the head of Jeff Crandall, the singer of Swallows from Minneapolis. While that band was busy recording for a third album, Crandall worked on songs that went the other way. He abandoned the idea of taking things on his own because he became convinced that the numbers deserved more attention. So it came down to the fact that Deep In The Waves (Swallow The Music) became a side project of just about the whole band. Where Swallows follows a rootsier path, J. Briozo bows more to pop. ‘Blind’ sounds as ambitious as Radiohead, but more often The Beatles are the standard…. ‘Beautiful Mess’ has something of Matthew Sweet in terms of approach. And ‘Spinning Out’ is strongly reminiscent of Cavedogs because of the vocals. ‘Rain Song’ is a whisper pop. On ‘The Big Parade’ an electric guitar flies through the middle section and on ‘Las Cruces’ long guitar lines are placed. ‘Blue’ has some of Feelies, but at the closing number J. Briozo goes back even further in the past. Because the beautiful ‘Sun Sun True’ is gorgeous power pop with a sixties shine that reminds us of The Turtles.”