Ron Gallo may use music as a social commentary medium in which he tells you how ridiculous you are for listening to the music in the first place, but thats not going to make me like Gallo or his music any less. And while the title of this feature is “Fresh Track” and I am just writing about it over 6 months after it actually came out, well, sometimes you miss the real gems when you are wading through the muck and as always, Gallo shines like a goddamn diamond.

Listening as a music lover, the overdriven grunginess of his songs elicit a series of nostalgic jabs straight to the heart. Listening as a songwriter you can appreciate his ability to mesh what we experience every day, with social media bombardment and trying to instill some semblance of artistic vision without ripping off others or just feeding into an already overwhelming full pool of boiler plate boredom that exists in front of our eyes and ears at every turn.

The first song off of “Really Nice Guys” hit home especially hard. Brilliantly recorded in 3 parts (iPhone demo, live band demo and full Hollywood overproduced studio recording) and with context that most every artist has endured when sharing a new song with a friend and saying “well, its not done quite yet” or “I think it will need x guitar part”. Twinkling overproduced vocals and keys ringing out amongst guitar lines and drums.

We need more artists like Ron and his band. Not necessarily pointing the finger at our absurdity as a somewhat indirect suggestion to turn the finger around and point it at ourselves, a bit of self reflection and realization is never a bad thing. Don’t be like me and sit on this record for 6 months. Go buy it today.