A Personal Record from Sheepish Wonder
An album release from Sheepish Wonder comes through with a wonderfully unique and personal approach that breeds a pretty intense honesty at times with lyrics that can be descriptive, letting inner thoughts spill out everywhere for all to soak up, but also gives you so much character that you can't turn away from it.
[SOFT DEMO] is an album that spans an array of rock-influenced soundscapes, but there are also acoustic singles and plenty of experimental songwriting that comes into play as the album unfolds.
This is a record that displays chapters in someone's life, and again, these could be very descriptive, making them impactful and even connective in a lot of different ways.
Some tracks give you a much more personal and one-on-one style approach like "Lake of Fire", which comes through as a sort of cinematic and vast singer-songwriter, acoustic style track but that bit of a stripped down approach really lets you pay attention to the lyrics and that's what pulls you into songs like this.
This happens a few times throughout the record at least, and it's safe to say that the lyrics really paint a picture or tell a story again, usually from a very personal place, which feels completely authentic, and the music sets the mood for these so well.
Then there's tracks like "Heart Keeps Sinking", which has a more grunge or post-rock style feel, which works on several levels with those kinds of lyrics.
Tracks like this one are layered with some outstanding guitar tones, and I feel like this is almost like a compilation of songs that were done at different times, but all have a lot of that personal attribute.
I had a certain point where they feel like they were put together on one record, so you're listening through to these different parts of someone's life, and by doing so, you get a lot of pieces of the artist throughout the process.
Again, a lot of the stuff is so connective and can paint such vivid pictures, but it's all due to that honesty and the ability to write songs with fewer boundaries than you may be used to.
Those are the things that make this so intense.
Those are the attributes that make the record wrap itself around you and keep you right where it wants to.
It's very easy to get engulfed in this record because of that thick personality that's attached to it all.
One of my personal favorite tracks is one called "Waste your Time", which features some of the best staples that you hear throughout the record including that honesty but also this beautiful songwriting approach that blends the tonality of his voice, which is almost used like an instrument on this song, and with the layers of guitars that are used.
All of this makes for a unique and sort of lush but very deepening kind of atmosphere that you end up falling right into.
This is a project started by Matthew Brady around 2020, and you can tell that he has utilized his music to express himself without walls.
This makes for some of the best kinds of art in general. When someone is doing it to get things off their chest, express themselves, and create something that feels freeing when you hear it.
This is an album that speaks volumes for the artist simply because he was able to get so much out there on this record. There's so much authenticity to what he's singing about that you know it all came from someplace real.
The quality of the songs also changes here and there. Some songs feel almost like they're more lo-fi than others, but it works perfectly for the aesthetic of the record and what its sentiment is.
These songs are for him and him only. It is vulnerable, honest, packed with genuine personality, and again, built with no boundaries around it, so it doesn't matter what other people think.
What matters is that he was able to get this out there and the way that he needed to.
You can tell that this was something that must have been very cathartic for Matthew to write and release, but for whoever is listening, this can be quite relatable and connective, as I mentioned before.
The blend of rock and acoustic singer-songwriter, elements of folk, indie, bedroom pop, and more all create that almost cinematic and very emotionally driven soundscape, and it's something that you get caught up in.
This was a gorgeous record. I loved listening to it and hearing not only how honest he was and how he wrote the songs, but also how he was influenced by these different breeds of rock.
You'll have to listen to it to really get it, so I suggest you do that.
Don't just listen to one or two tracks. Listening to a few songs may give you an idea of what you can expect, but it will not give you the full spectrum of what the album has to offer as a whole.
Again, these are like chapters in his life, and listening through is the only way you get the full story, but also you were able to get all these different layers, textures, influences, and songwriting approaches throughout the journey.
Take a deep dive into this one and see what it does for you.
