While the world was falling apart, Marco Benevento retreated to Fred Short Studios, his home studio in Woodstock, N.Y., where the vibe was loose, adventurous and fun. The resulting effort, simply titled Benevento, is the keyboard maestro’s best album in years, a psychedelic patchwork of hooky party-starters (“Winter Rose”), fractured song fragments (“Polysix”) and warped keyboard solos (“The Warm Up”). It may be the best representation yet of Benevento’s body of work—a compelling fusion of his more experimental instrumental days (dating back to the beloved Benevento/Russo Duo) and the vocal-heavy dancefloor jams of recent years. Benevento nods to Paul McCartney’s trio of self-titled albums not only through both its name and cover art, but also in its overall approach; he plays nearly all of the instruments himself, only adding light percussion from West African drummer Mamadouba “Mimo” Camara and backing vocals by his wife, Katie Benevento, and their daughter Ruby. He sets the tone with the 90-second “Like Me,” a woozy piano piece that slides right into “Marco And Mimo,” an upbeat, nonsensical jammer with Camara and the Beneventos. The West African sound of William Onyeabor is front-and-center on the bouncy track, which finds Benevento stating, not singing, what might as well be a mission statement: “I appreciate the way you accentuate what I consider to be the positive.” The robotic vocals of “Mountain Cougar,” meanwhile, give off Daft Punk vibes. “We Were Here” and album standout “Winter Rose”— another pair that seamlessly bleed together—could have come from Neon Indian or Toro y Moi during indie’s lo-fi chillwave era. “If every thorn came with a winter rose/ Then everything was worth it, yes, I suppose,” Benevento sings on the latter. In a first, Benevento collaborated with poet Al Howard on the lyrics to four tracks (including those two), setting Howard’s poetry to music—a fruitful collaboration that adds depth and allows Benevento to focus on what he does best: creating vivid sonic tapestries.
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