Tommy Oeffling – Neighbors | Album Review
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22Twenty
There are many ways for an artist to excel, but there’s something particularly alluring about those who can be described as “prolific.” Speaking logically, I understand that songwriting is a craft that requires dedication. I understand that most people who are good at it got that way by consistently putting in the work. Some artists though—the ones that really intrigue me, the ones that truly earn that prolific label—seem to extend beyond this. It’s just tough for me to look at someone with an output like, say, Robert Pollard, and not think there’s some sort of metaphysical connection at play. It’s impressive enough when someone makes one good record in their entire life; the ability to make multiple within a period of months borders on alien.
That said, volume of work by itself means nothing. We live in an attention economy where cranking out content is key to success and recording music has never been easier. Sometimes it feels like people are just putting material out for the sake of putting it out. Within the world of indie rock specifically, the canonization of Alex G’s Bandcamp days seems to have sent droves of college students scrambling for cheap audio interfaces with hopes that releasing many records in quick succession might send them down the road to semi-superstardom paved by their hero. At this point, Alex G is the most aped musician this side of MJ Lenderman, and as much as I love his music, overexposure to that style has made my hackles go up whenever a record’s selling point is that it was recorded in a bedroom.
I say all this to tell you that I was somewhat suspicious when I first came across Tommy Oeffling. By all appearances, it seemed this self-recording one-man slacker rock band who put out seven records in four years would be fully cut from the mold I’d recently soured on, but I gave him a listen anyway, and I was totally wrong. There’s no doubt that Oeffling is influenced by Alex G, but his latest release, Neighbors, makes clear that he’s no imitator, with the influence serving as a jumping-off point rather than a blueprint.
This is perhaps most apparent on “How to Age Gracefully,” a nine-minute mid-album cut that flies by thanks to its effortless traversal of moods and tempos. Early in the song, we hear one of the main things that sets Oeffling apart from others in this kind of bedroom-rock space: he’s not afraid of clean vocals. As he enters, the intro’s leisurely guitar lead falls away, leaving him front and center over low organ, plodding bass, and acoustic guitar chords that are so soft they’re barely even there. The addition of Oeffling’s deep voice to this already low-end-tilted tableau could easily turn the whole mix to mud, but its raw presentation, paired with his delivery, does the opposite, and he pops out of the speakers. Even when the lead guitar comes back to sit alone at the high end of the register, it never feels like it’s competing with his voice, which remains the song’s focal point. There is certainly a “slacker” quality to the way Oeffling sings, but he never crosses the line to full apathy; because of this, his voice can carry a lot of weight, giving him tons of freedom with the rest of the arrangement.
After this placid beginning, “How to Age Gracefully” moves through a two-minute instrumental crescendo, steadily growing in speed and volume until we’re spat out into the next passage, where the song becomes a more straightforward dual-guitar rocker. When Oeffling’s vocals return, the presentation is a touch different; his voice isn’t totally lo-fi or washed out, but it moves in that direction, with saturation that feels like a subtler take on the vocal processing of earlier Strokes records. As much as I loved the first section’s more natural vocals, the added edge fits here, and it’s cool to see the way that Oeffling, in his role as both producer and performer, is able to shift gears so effectively.
The penultimate song, “Roy’s Accordion,” is another track whose general palette and approach really impressed me. The start has a sort of bossa nova-tinged Jack Johnson vibe, with Oeffling's unprocessed voice once again shining through. It’s a minimal arrangement with warmth in its simplicity, and the sparse sonics allow little touches, like the snaps we hear in the background, to make a big impact. At the end of the first verse, a descending guitar line cuts into this warmth, pairing well with a wistful quality Oeffling adds to his voice as he sings “I’ve spent many moons with you / I’ve spent half my life with you / I’ve been trying not to use.” This interplay, where warmth gets cut by doubt, repeats itself a few times until we get to the song’s finale where we finally get our ears on the promised accordion. It’s used sparingly, but does its job well, leading into one of my favorite instrumental sections of the record.
When Oeffling does deploy that more straight-up lo-fi sound I initially expected would dominate the record, he’s equally impressive. I know I said earlier that I’d grown a little sick of this bedroom-rock sound, but the way it’s used on Neighbors, as part of a bouquet rather than the sole flower, makes it feel fresher. When the crash cymbals and fuzzy guitar bleed together on “Psycho,” I can’t say it sounds anything other than great, and as much as I loved the exposed vocals discussed earlier, hearing Oeffling’s voice saturated almost to the point of clipping delivers its own kind of magic.
Album closer “Grab Your Cameras” is another track where cymbals and guitar meld together perfectly, this time paired with a ferociously rolling snare that gets you out of your seat. On these more washed-out songs, the cymbals really steal the show, something attributable just as much to Oeffling the producer as it is to Oeffling the artist. When you work independently as he does, wearing both of these hats, one of the biggest dangers is that nobody is there to tell you no. In that scenario, it’s easy to take what is initially a cool sound and drive it into the ground or spend hours adding unnecessary layers to songs that do no favors to the final mix. There’s none of that here; the artist is able to tame himself without stifling his expression—no easy feat.
After listening to Neighbors, I went back and explored the rest of Oeffling’s catalog. Having enjoyed the new record, I wasn’t necessarily surprised to find that I liked his other work, but I was surprised by how good he was from the jump. In Oeffling’s early releases, I expected little more than traces of raw talent waiting to be discovered, but instead I found great song after great song from an artist who seemingly emerged almost fully formed. Neighbors is certainly more polished than what came before it, but when I listened to songs like “out of tune again” from hand-in-hand or “fresh to death” from secret knowledge of backroads my takeaway wasn’t “this has potential”; it was “this is awesome.” And the thing is, I’ve barely scratched the surface. Beyond Oeffling’s deep catalog of solo records are collaborative projects like jumper seat and PRIVATE SCHOOL, plus scores of demos and one-off singles; it seems like music just constantly flows out of the guy.
I went into this review fairly suspicious and came out the other side converted. Oeffling is the real deal, one of those artists whose musical ease boggles my mind. Maybe the most exciting thing about this realization is that I doubt I’ll have to wait long to hear what he does next. Even if I do, I can’t complain; if he’s making records like this at his current pace, imagine what he’ll do if he stews for a year or two. It’s too early to say that Oeffling is the second coming of Robert Pollard (we’ll need to check back in another 40 albums or so), but I don’t think I’d be off base in saying the two are cut from the same cloth. Both seem to write songs as easily as others write diary entries, and for both I believe that the praise these songs bring is secondary to whatever they feel while they’re creating. That’s why Oeffling hits for me where similar acts haven’t: his volume of work is driven by personal desire rather than a quota or some understanding of what a musician in this day and age is supposed to do. He’s an artist rather than a careerist, and as long as he stays on that path, there’s a lot of great music ahead of him.
Josh Ejnes is a writer and musician living in Chicago. He has a blog about cassette tapes called Tape Study that you can find here, and he also makes music under the name Cutaway Car.
