B.C CAMPLIGHT is the curious alias of one Brian Christinzio: a hugely talented young honcho who's already been referred to as "the American Badly Drawn Boy" and whose music may come as something as a surprise to those of you who might superficially expect him to sound like another of One Little Indian's quality Americana-related signings in the tradition of Jesse Malin and Jeff Klein.
Not that I would realistically expect Messrs. Klein and/ or Malin to release an album with a cover depicting what appears to be the headless victim of a man-eating squirel/ beaver (still not able to pin it down for sure), but the warped playfulness that's apparently on offer also spreads to BC'S music, which is a quirkily likeable melange of great, unashamed pop with enough twists to keep you marvelling.
Like whizz kids such as Beck and Damon Gough, Christinzio plays virtually everything you hear and he clearly has an ear for melody, invention and gleefully pushing square pegs through round holes, usually in the best possible way. Indeed, opener "Couldn't You Tell" gives you some idea of his capabilities, finding sparkling Bacharachian melodies flirting with bossa novas and cheesy, Cars-style retro-synth bits. By rights, he shouldn't get away with it unscathed, but he does - and with accessibility to spare. It's excellent stuff and opens with the intriguing lines: "If you offer me a second chance, I would quickly need another", which can't fail to raise a smile.
Second tune, "Blood & Peanut Butter" soon proves this is no fluke and also may well be the best sonic tribute to confectionery and corpuscules since Elvis Costello's "Blood & Chocolate". This one's stridently daffy pop with just a hint of They Might Be Giants and finds Philadelphia-based singer Cynthia Mason providing the 'answering' voice.
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So far so good, and before long it dawns on you just how versatile BC really is, as he takes on languid, Alt.Country ballads with gently weeping strings ("Wouldn't Mind The Sunshine"), punchy, trumpet-assisted pop ("Richard Dawson"), jaunty Burt Bacharach-meets-late-Beatles affairs ("Hide, Run Away") and even marries a complex tale about killing your ex-lover's father to win back your ex-girlfriend's good graces (are you following this?) to a plangent piano framework on "Emily's Dead To Me."
Actually, BC'S attraction to bizarre relationship scenarios gets twisted to apparent breaking point on "Parapaleejo", where our hero explains to his fiance that he had an affair with a circus performer. The unlikely lyrical twists are taken even further out by the music which harbours elements of burlesque and (whisper it) rock opera a la The Who's "A Quick One While He's Away", plus some Ben Folds for good measure. And yeah - you guessed it - he even pulls this bugger off with tolerance to spare.
So however esoteric it may initially appear, B.C Camplight is indeed a name to conjure and certainly a name liable to become synonymous with star quality. "Hide, Run Away" is a title instructing you to scarper forthwith, but the attractively diverse pop contained within suggests you should stick around and embrace it lock, stock and barrel.
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