Play 90 second soundbite of 'Burn' @ 'CD quality'
'Circles And Squares' is like a double-edged sword; it can be restful and evocative or it can be softly rocking and dynamic. Rodino writes beautiful words and that's quite clear right from the off! He also scripts pretty amazing music to bring his words to life - but Francis Rodino doesn't stop there, oh no, Rodino is also a damn fine all-round musician and is found here playing guitar, keyboards, percussion and cello as well as doing a bit of programming and all the other studio bits and bobs. Then, of course, there's the Rodino voice; his somewhat American inflection gives his songs a trans-Atlantic feel which should stand him in good stead on either side of the 'big pond'. Mind you, I see that he gives his 'roots' as London/New York so I suppose his Americanism is something much more than pseudo!
Francis Rodino's words tend to be optimistically honest; Rodino never gets too dark or sinister but by the same token he doesn't really do glib, over-simplistic or flippant either - it's all a beautiful balance of sentiment, observation and comment that errs on the positive side and therefore always comes across as quite up-lifting and nicely rewarding. The arrangements here are pretty awesome; there's often quite a lot going on with guitars soaring, keyboards punctuating and backing voices offering additional depth and structural finesse. And, 'Circles And Squares', given even half a chance, has the potential to be a real 'monster' album for the exceptionally gifted Francis Rodino!
'Circles And Squares' by Francis Rodino straddles several pop oriented genre, it's wondefully easy on the ear and yet it has an inherent maturity and over-riding feeling of emotional well-being and is distictly hooky and certainly begs to be played over and over. And, more plays brings new discoveries; 'Circles And Squares' opens up even more with repeat plays and starts to become pretty unputdownable. 'Circles And Squares' by the multi-talented Francis Rodino is 'proper' music for the modern age; built on solid foundations and flavoured with musical nuances from several, wide-ranging genre, it's a real grower and a potential modern 'classic'.
'Circles And Squares' by Francis Rodino is an album of finely honed, softly rocking songs delivered with near-tangible passion and massive professionalism. Watch out for this album, watch out for Francis Rodino - this could be really big!!
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