Customer Reviews

Arcuragi, Adam

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In a world that rewards and applauds mediocrity in music, discovering a songwriter like Adam Arcuragi is a rare treat. A Philadelphia artist with an expansive world view, the 11 tracks on this disc are absolutely seductive. I use that word in its most literal sense, not sexual or convertive, but in the sense that you just get drawn in to his particular form of storytelling.

Storytelling is a slowly-disappearing art, especially in music, but Adam manages to tell absorbing vignettes within the 5-minute song structure. The instrumentation is simple, but not sparse; driven by the acoustic guitar, backing vocals lushly layered, and unusual choices, such as vibraphone or singing saw. In fact, only in the last track does he use the guitar/bass/drums formula. (By the way, that last track, "The Christmas Song" is so masterfully written, arranged, and performed, it's like an addiction to heartache. It's sung with such longing, and makes you wish there was a twelfth track to ease you, so you end up playing the track again...and again...but to continue...)

I wish I knew what to compare it to. The closest I can get is "like Iron & Wine, but with more guts" or "Nick Drake without the self-destruction". Because it takes a certain amount of chutzpah to throw so much of yourself personally, just emotionally out there, and then invite the listener for the ride, and do it with such infectious joy. "Broken Throat" will have you stomping and clapping with the performance.

Adam was quoted recently, "One does not praise the hammer for the house." True, but one can surely praise the architect and his crew for a fine place to make a home. Fantastic debut. Pray he comes to your town.

I have one of his songs off an urban outfitters compliation cd.
The song haunted me for a long time(years) yet I never seeked out this artist's work. Recently, I dug up the old cd to get the spelling of his name. I purchased his cd here.

The best frigin thing I've done in a long time. He's not playing in Florida anytime soon, so me and wife are talking about flying out to catch one of his shows. The kid is from philly.