Nik Freitas "Sun Down" (Team Love)
By Tim Bugbee
Wednesday. Jun 11, 5:30 PM
Not afraid to tread the waters of pop innocence.

Nik Freitas is not afraid to tread the waters of pop innocence, as seen through the prism of the '70s and filtered with a healthy dose of piano, McCartney-style. He's got a sunny look, a pleasant disposition on life: things are looking up, and he wants to share his smile and good vibes with you. Corpse-paint wearers, this is the garlic and silver stake to your dark, nosferatun ways. Instead, if you had a dad with a slight Paul Simon fetish, you'll have flashbacks. His voice is also eerily similar to Jeff Tweedy's at times, though he's not in the same songwriting caliber. The recording style is a bit different to the current norm: the vocals are pushed way up front, and aside from the gentle piano lines which push and pull the songs along, the rest of the mix is very subdued and stands a few paces back. Every now and then, a cymbal wash will come and go ("What You Become"), and "See Me There" heads out with an impromptu guitar strum and keyboard note, collects itself with a 1-2-3-4 countdown, the drums kick in, and then... it all fades away, stripped down to Nik's plaintive vocals for the first verse. Polite guitar lines and courteous strings build more of a backdrop, until the multi-tracked vocals take a hard left, straight on to Penny Lane. Of all the sleeve-worn influences, by far my favorite is the start of "All The Way Down," which sounds like a long-lost outtake from Grin, until the chorus comes in and lands a Macca attack on whatever Lofgren bits were previously there. If your pop quotient is flagging and needs a refill, there are far worse options than Nik's latest record.
www.nikfreitas.com
www.team-love.com

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Tim Bugbee

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