Smile by Joseph Turkot

"Smile" is a masterful 22-track debut album by new-to-the-scene indie singer-songwriter Joseph Turkot. The development of Turkot's indie sound has ranged the depths of human experience while showcasing influences from The Beatles through to Elliott Smith. Each song packs a walloping expression of the human spirit. From the galloping title track, "Smile," now featured in the Lions Gate feature film “Mancation,” starring Danica McKellar and Joey Fatone, listeners get a sense of Turkot's pop sensibility and Beatles influence. "Lay Down Your Old Sense" dips into the country flavor influenced by an indie edge and a sadness that permeates many of the tracks found on the album. The depth of the album truly begins once a listener reaches track #3, "My Best Goodbye," an obviously Lennon-inspired song, and allusive of "Mother." The song grinds out authenticity in each vocal note and evokes the scene of a childhood come round to tragic fruition, and finally acceptance and release.

Once the listener gets to "Right From The Start," the indie connection becomes clear: here, in all their influential glory, are the vocalizations of Neutral Milk Hotel. The crunchy fuzz-pop charges loudly and amorously into "Like Yourself," a slow, delicate track of heartfelt compassion for the self-pitying co-dependent. Thus begins a change in Turkot's staggering 22-track debut--the track selection is impeccable, such that the flow of the album takes listeners on a journey into the cosmic dips, ebbs, and waxings of the most vital of human journeys. “I’m Not To Blame Anymore” is a melodic, synth-piano driven attack on releasing shame driven by a climactic ending worthy of a sing-along. Again, going from upbeat to the melancholy, Turkot delivers “I Went Down,” a morose reflection of the passage to self desecration endured by all people who fail to meet the expectation of perfection placed upon them by their own personal standards of morality.

By Track #8, Turkot shows his first homage to Elliott Smith, the hauntingly simple and beautiful call to a lover who may or may not wish to return his love: “Let Me In.” Again, the album triumphs to the tune of the slightly Sublime-esque, upbeat, synth-heavy tune “Live.” The chorus rings out thematically to fit the album: “I’ll live better than my father did.” The eclectic “I Want to be a Dinosaur” is an enigma; the song is half prog-rock, half arena rock, all lofi exploration and experimentation, and a play on childhood fantasy lost on adulthood. Keeping with its traditional dips and rises, the album falls to the sparse, tragic “Lonely.” This song, simple acoustic guitar and a breakingly thin vocal, elicits the condition of loneliness like few songs have in the past few years.

“Start” kicks off the second half of the album, and is entirely reminiscent of early Elliott Smith. The curling acoustic guitar layers, the beautiful melody work, and the haunting story of drugs and addiction within remind one of the first two Smith albums. “It’s Not Hard” sparks the second truly country-flavored song of the album, showcasing again Turkot’s diversity and ability to possess sadness through simple chords in a miraculous display of self-harmony. “Praying Mantis” can only be described as a light pop tune, with a terrific display of strange falsetto work. Despite this, the track is one of the weaker efforts on the album. “What Not To Be” is a scarring look at a father who is addicted and dying. Hard to listen to for its brutal lyrics and honest assessment of tragedy, it is also one of the strongest tracks on the album. “Dirty Woman,” another sparse folk-rock number, shows the simple elegant of a beautiful, sarcastic hook.
Perhaps the stand-out track of the entire album, Turkot eschews the synthetic instrumentation of some of his former tracks to play the drums himself, and here, the lofi beauty is unparalleled. The elegant ringing of the open-ended lyric, “When I Take Your Hand,” leaves one dreamy. “If You’re Ever Getting Better” is another track where Turkot hops on drums and plays, along with bass, and the effect is immediate. This track has a driving chorus allusive of Jawbreaker.

“Come Back Quickly,” a track orginally written with Turkot’s former band “Deployment,” is a haunting I-Want-You-Back tune, and the flashes of his songwriting genius shine through. Taking a turn for the Bowie, Turkot unleashes “Not What I Thought,” starting with the swaying acoustic guitar, heavily filtered, which spouts, “The light is not what I thought.” “In Your Way,” a sort of closing song before the closing, is a simple, stereo-tricking track of innocent self-affirmation. The final tender piece of the album, “I Hope We Go,” sounds Turkot’s hope for a potential love. This song sounds also the listener’s hope that there will be another album soon. Pick this album up. If you find yourself listening to only half the songs here over and over again, then you will have a typical album’s worth of songs in rotation. An effort that should be played on college radios everywhere. This is the sort of open, honest, anti-polish that the music scene so desperately needs.

josephturkot.com
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