REVIEW: Harry Hochman — Inside Out (SINGLE)
Harry Hochman’s title track for his full-length debut Inside Out announces his arrival with high style. Pairing his talents with respected musician and producer Chris Murphy has proven to be a shrewd move in positioning his material for the best possible audience response — both as a direct musical contributor and for his framing of the song’s sonic architecture. They are ably assisted by other musical cohorts, without question, but Hochman and Murphy serve as the chief focal points for the title song and, I expect, the remainder of Inside Out’s running order.
URL: https://harryhochmanmusic.com/
Murphy’s effect on “Inside Out”, the single, is obvious from the first. His mandolin playing does a lot, though far from all, of the heavy melodic lifting for this track. He’s an attentive player as well who keys a number of critical turns in the song’s arrangement around his work on the mandolin’s fretboard. His contributions certainly work as Hochman’s chief accompaniment throughout the song.
His voice, however, is more than enough to bear the load. He’s complemented with some backing vocals for scattered passages, but it’s the character and world-weary strength of Hochman’s voice that gives “Inside Out” most of its identity. He mixes things up, as well, rarely singing two lines in a row the same way and fleshing out the single with all of the interpretive skills he can muster at that second.
You definitely get the feeling that you’ll never hear Hochman sing these lyrics the same way twice.
It’s a living, breathing thing for him. It’s one of the qualities of “Inside Out” that stands out the most for me. It’s effervescent, full of life yet never blustery, and the wide-eyed connection Hochman clearly has with his song makes you want to hear anything he’s willing to write and/or sing. He doesn’t drone on too long either as “Inside Out” starts and concludes within a little over four and a half minutes without ever wearying the audience.
There’s definitely a target audience for this work. Hochman’s playing for listeners like himself, in some respects, listeners who’ve survived life’s various wringers and want to enjoy hearing great music communicating about travails and triumphs they can relate to. They want to hear someone capable of voicing the same misgivings about the world. Hochman does that with a near-effortless elan that never borders on the hokey.
“Inside Out” will hold up for a long time to come. Hochman’s instincts for composing lasting songs are sharp and will only grow sharper over time. “Inside Out” is impervious, as well, to the passage of time and will sound as fresh and current two decades from now as it does today. We need this sort of timeless art more than ever before. The world jostles collapses, and rebuilds on itself, so little seems dependable, but musical artists such as Harry Hochman are offering something we can tether ourselves to in these increasingly fragile days.
You can’t put a price tag on that. Harry Hochman’s “Inside Out” reminds us, in its own small way, why that’s so important.
Colin Jordan
