Doesn’t Quite Hit The Mark

In life, breaking up is hard to do. In music, listening to a break-up record can be equally as difficult. The break-up record is to the singer/songwriter as the Hail Mary is to a NFL quarterback: oft-attempted but hardly ever successful. Usually melodramatic and gloomy, these albums often serve better as therapy for the musician than as solid musical contributions (a recent exception being Beck’s mopey gem Sea Change.) Enter Mark Ramos-Nishita, aka Money Mark, a producer-extraordinaire with a side gig as a carpenter who turned a handyman maintenance job into a musical career spinning for the Beastie Boys. Ramos-Nishita has released the innovative mish-mashings of Mark’s Keyboard Repair and Change Is Coming, as well as the catchy pop sounds of Push The Button. Ramos-Nishita wields an impressive resume indeed, which offers hope to the hypothesis that Brand New By Tomorrow will be more thrilling than your average break-up record.

In some ways the theory holds true. Ramos-Nishita’s influences are first-rate and his subtle tributes are a jaunt through the mind of someone who loves music. “Every Day I Die A Little” could have been recorded for The Beatles’ White Album, “Summer Blues” grooves on a funky, Beck-inspired bass line and “Radiate Nothing” is a dead-on impersonation of the other great Elvis: Costello. Unfortunately, Ramos-Nishita’s shift to his own voice doesn’t translate as well. The rest of Brand New shrivels into an uninspiring blend of break-up record clichés. From dull (“Nice To Me”) and tedious (“My Loss, Your Gain”) to predictable (“Pretend To Sleep” opens with “Talk to me / Did I see your eyes start to roll?”), Brand New hits all the wrong branches on the way down.

While Ramos-Nishita offers enjoyable moments, listeners will certainly walk away feeling glad that Money Mark is having a good cry and getting this one out of his system.