Bradley Gaskin has tasted mainstream success. The Alabama-born singer/songwriter inked a major label deal in 2010 that soon led to an original, “Mr. Bartender”, spending 20 weeks on the charts and reaching as high as the Top 40 on Billboard’s Indicator chart. Similar or greater triumphs should have followed. However, record company machinations soon felled Gaskin’s promise and the young songwriter found himself without a record deal in short order. Fate snatched the brass ring from his grasp without apology or ceremony.
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His new single “Accidentally Drunk” and forthcoming debut EP offer evidence of his talents. Labeling Gaskin as a country music traditionalist is fair, but what is tradition to one listener, another recognizes as pure fundamentals. There isn’t anything particularly genre-centric about the song. It chronicles one man’s struggle with loneliness and a weakness for drinking with plainspoken clarity that never sentimentalizes the subject matter. A recurring slide guitar flourish punctuates the song’s mid-tempo amble. It’s more a product of the singer/songwriter tradition than fitting into a retro country mold. “Accidentally Drunk” doesn’t belong to a particular era.
Gaskin has long understood how to temper his vocal presence. He colors the words for “Accidentally Drunk” with dimly lit melancholy that never presses too hard on listeners. Instead, you hear a singer committed to working closely with his material rather than trying to impose his vocal will over the song’s development. He has a calm and steadying presence over the track that encourages you to invest confidence in his delivery.
This new EP isn’t a half-hearted return. Songs such as “30A Blonde” treads over familiar territory, but Gaskin tackles its celebratory vibe with such aplomb that it takes on an unique spin. Southern rock influences are rife throughout the cut. This is a song that’s having an unabashed good time; Gaskin jettisons the brooding bogging down the preceding cut. “Sunset & Wine” distills its classic country pedigree into instrumental echoes virtually indistinguishable from modern pop song traditions. It again comes down to fundamentals. It’s also evidence of how artists such as Gaskin refuse to mire themselves into the past and endeavor to update the genre’s time-tested appeal for modern audiences.
“Bumpin’ Buckles” is a definite highlight. Gaskin’s declarative vocals over an unadorned acoustic guitar backing improbably recall Bruce Springsteen. He has an effortless swagger that’s never so heavy-handed as to make the song laughable. It’s brief, but laden with detail, and provides listeners with a notable stylistic shift. An acoustic performance of “Without You” is available on TikTok and is a vocal showcase for Gaskin. He grounds much of his musical art in modern sensibilities but hearing his voice in such a setting underlines the classic pipes he brings to country-themed material. There’s nothing in this vein that he can’t sing.
We can expect he will continue utilizing his voice with songs covering a wide range of subjects. Nothing about the five aforementioned songs indicates that Gaskin is afraid to go wherever his Muse leads him. It’s safe to assume, given his years out of the professional music world, that he won’t soon exhaust what he has to say.
Garth Thomas