aaamusic | On 16, Aug 2010

Taking the nickname from a female friend due to the colour of her eyes and his friends calling him a ‘shark’, the ‘experiment’ part of the name refers to the album, from its inception to delivery and BES’s (Blue Eyed Shark’s) additional musical protagonists. Adopted at 6 weeks and growing up under the watchful eye of his Bolivian Godfather, surrounded by Andalucians and Columbians (including the great Garcia Marques) The Blue Eyed Shark certainly had a different start.

With the passing of his father at age 8, trouble in his teens, broken hearts in the early twenties – and then cancer (thankfully removed and diagnosed gone) – you could say life has thrown BES a few curve balls. Regardless, as you will find, his resolve was in his cheerful, driven and optimistic nature.

Despite his life being so hard, his music retains a great sense of hope and optimism. The new single Tapdance is a catchy of pop-rock tune that drops a fine sense of melody and invites people to go tap-dancing in the rain. The guitar licks are crisp, the laidback vocals highly appealing and the electronic arrangements a fine accompaniment.

At first listening The Fluffer is a strange album, inspired by loads of different artist and genres – you can find some traces of Lou Reed, David Bowie etc. Sometimes a bit of classic pop, it lacks of homogeneity, seeming a collection of songs more than a whole album. But let’s go back to the eponymous first track. The Fluffer is an instrumental intro that seems to come out from a circus, accompanying a clown show, but its dark juxtaposing haunting wails by Milla Jovovich with a growling male vocal, so it leaves a sense of anxiety, piano repeats the same chords for the whole tune, like in a horror movie.

Goodbye my little friend dissipates these feelings with its simplicity, it’s a pop tune which beg the listener to sing along, while What to do invites to chill out and listen to its reggae rhythm, like if you were on a beach drinking a cocktail decorated with a rainbow umbrella. The arrangement is remarkable; the tune is enriched with a crescendo of choirs and synths that suddenly turn off to come back to the previous rhythm.

Sleep next to me is a wonderful lullaby, my fav track. Supported by a delightful piano backdrop reminding something of Coldplay, BES warms your heart with his sweet voice, lyrics are simple and a bit naïve, but you’ll love this tune just for this reason.

Generation is completely different from the rest of the album, there’s a background choirs that tastes of German 90’s dance music, with a massive use of old fashioned synths.

Beautiful is a pop ballad that doesn’t leave a mark while Look Back is involving and you cant’ fail to sing-along the second refrain, musically is based on piano, like the other songs, accompanied by some nice electro sounds to give it a touch of colour.

Jet Plane is purely a dance track, distorted vocals and an electro groove supported by a catchy guitar riff, it suddenly stops to start again with a very kitsch groove, it’s the worst tune and has no sense compared to the rest.

With Rain BES comes back to “normality” and it could be a good second single, with its carrying away refrain supported by a joyful piano arrangement.

The album finishes in a positive fashion with Ticket Outta Here, and this musician has every right to feel optimistic about the future, but I think he had to think to present first. This album has been released too early, there’s something good, but it’s still raw and needs to be better refined.

Author: Roberta Capuano