Riding at night, entering a tunnel with a cigarette in your mouth, blowing out the smoke while blowing out words that will never be said, and probably will go down the grave with you.
A psychedelic album musically is being introduced to us by Ruto from LA, USA. Releasing his Indie Pop album “Pan Dulce”.
The album consists of 10 tracks, each has its theme and also language. Some tracks were in English; others were in Spanish. The diversity of language in the record granted a multicultural vibe giving the album a deeper touch.
the first track “No Repeats” starts with a fingerstyle guitar smooth sound and then is mixed with a joyful and dreamy melody and rhythm. The second track “Fine Tune” kicks off with a slight lo-fi hip-hop theme but then jumps back to the original sound of the album which is keyboard melodies and fingerstyle guitar notes.
The same applies to the third track “Shallow Thought” as Ruto is preserving the overall atmosphere of the record by adding the melodic nostalgic tones to the track.
The fourth track “Another Try” begins with a melody that is close in sound to Daft Punk‘s “One More Time” in a playful, silly manner.
It’s almost like Ruto divided the album into a CD1 & CD2 and made every CD have a distinctive theme and vibes. Whilst jumping off to the fifth track entitled “Every Step” but holding a different kind of theme, with less melody in it and more seriousness in terms of sound and of course lyrically more conceptual and having a deeper meaning.
The awesome nostalgic, brain-tearing intro exists in the sixth track “Si Lo Sientes” which translates into “If You Feel It” having mesmerizing guitar tunes. And same applies to the seventh track “Go Alone” as if Ruto decided to give the keys a break and relied more on guitars.
The eighth track is “Todo Lo Que Hago” translated into “Everything I Do” holding emotional vocals and Spanish-themed guitar and percussion.
Coming off to the ninth track titled “Mundo Entre Mundo” translated into “World inside World” and here you could feel the dots are connected between the smooth guitar riffs and the keyboard soft melodies in “CD1”.
And the final track entitled “Commentario” has a bohemian theme from guitars to vocals and keys. It’s like a fusion of all elements and concepts in the album.
The album is a great brain traveler and an exciting companion in search of some soulful music. “The music and art reflect a variety of introspective thoughts that goes into a bold explosion of sound and color. The various emotions explored by the artist, Ruto, vary from somber melodies to anthemic ballads of dream pop, bedroom pop, indie rock, and soul” Ruto stated.
I was listening to this album feeling somehow heavy, but out of nowhere I felt that I was dragged to a world solely created by the record that I forgot about what was bothering me. It threw me away to a different place and made me jump into a completely different mood.
The vocals in the record need improvement, sometimes vocal notes aren’t high enough to compete with the high notes of the instruments. Also, it felt at some certain point that vocals are out of tone and vocal key. It sure needs development.
But all in all the record is worth listening to in a manner whenever you might feel empty inside or somewhat lost, this is the place you might want to visit.
