Louie Sanchez, the moniker for Pantayo‘s Eirene Cloma, has released the self-titled EP via Next Door Records.
A wonderful intimate singer/songwriter folk-pop EP.
About the EP by Louie:
“At the beginning, I thought I’d make a country album,” says Cloma, “And then producer [Simone Schmidt] asked me, ‘well, what is country?’ which got me thinking about how to make this record really sound like me.”
Where Pantayo plays with percussive atonal delirium (what they call “lo-fi R&B gong punk”),
Louie Sanchez is inspired by the self-assured croon of Filipino folk music, harana. Harana is a courtship practice in which a man serenades his beloved from outside her window, hoping to gain her attention. “When I think of harana, I think of a voice that fills the humid, tropical air.
You know, like you’re listening to the radio on a warm summer evening and a song is crackling from the speaker, keeping you company.”
It’s not an overstatement to say Eirene Cloma has the rare vocal talent deep enough to lend gravity and smoky enough to fill the entire room. It shines on “Notice Me”, where the desire for recognition is paired down to the penetrating lucidity of voice and finger-style guitar. “Here with Me Now,” has an overt country flair thanks to its pedal steel twang, but the luscious declaration of the chorus (“all i want is you/in that perfect moment/here with me now”) plays in the risky low-end of ‘adult contemporary’ – think reverent, slightly cheeky nod to the glory of the Women & Songs era, Tracy Chapman does James Taylor. ““I think of Louie as a humble, soft spoken singer,” says Cloma, “I’ve always loved solo acts. Jose Gonzalez, k.d. Lang, Paula Cole, Jim Croce — I mean, who can deny a good Sheryl Crow song?”
Self-titled EP gets: 📷📷📷📷📷📷📷/10.
Louie Sanchez – Louie Sanchez EP [Streaming]
