Best Album of the Day: Jeremy Messersmith

I love finding good music I haven't heard before. Last year, I stumbled across a local fellow's myspace page named Jeremy Messersmith. Very seldom do the first few chords and the initial vocal line draw me in the way his did that day. I believe the first song I heard was "Novocain". I listened to that particular track a few times before I moved on to other songs in his collection.

His debut album, The Alcatraz Kid, is solid from beginning to end. He has a somewhat melancholy style of writing, but not in an overly depressing sort of way. Messersmith writes about love (and lack there of), life frustrations, and childhood memories. You get little glimpses of his upbringing through lyrics of a few songs. Apparently his parents really wanted him to be a scientist. From what I gathered from an interview I heard, he was home schooled in Washington State, and moved to Minneapolis in 1999 to study music at North Central University. He used to hand out free copies of his music after live shows wrapped in a brown paper sandwich bag. Eventually, he released The Alcatraz Kid in 2006. He is currently working on a follow up album with local producer Dan Wilson.

Personally, I love this sort of stuff. Infectious melodies, descriptive heart felt lyrics, written mostly in minor keys. I'm excited to hear what the next album has in store. I'm curious to see if the lyrics will be a little more uplifting with the recent success of his first album. Time will tell.