Gamers who were a fan of the fourteenth installment of the Final Fantasy series no doubt remember its soundtrack, and most of all, its vocalist in one Susan Calloway, whose new single “Favorite Scar” is earning a lot of hype around the American underground this season – and rightly so. In this latest release to feature Calloway at the microphone, her vocals are joined by a powerful instrumental framework that is as steeped in as much of a pop concept as it is the foundations of an epic classical/rock crossover, and while it’s a bit progressive for the mainstream, it’s a listen I would recommend at any rate.
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Vocal prowess is one thing, but if you thought that it’s the only element of grandeur this singer/songwriter was going to be conjuring up and inserting in her latest release, you’d better think again. “Favorite Scar” is weighted by some of the more fluid instrumental harmonies I’ve heard out of a hybrid single this October, and although they’re punctuated by a rigid percussive attack on the back-side of the track via the drums, there aren’t any hiccups between the play button and the climax in the chorus at all.
Emotion isn’t sourced from the lyrics exclusively in “Favorite Scar,” but instead from the relationship that Calloway forms with her backing band throughout the whole of the single. Conventionally, harmonies are responsible for upping the chills factor in the pop genre, and to some extent, this is the lone area in which our leading lady is following a formula familiar to most on the FM dial. What separates her efforts from that of the mainstream player is the detail with which she uses to convey deeper emotionality in these verses, each of which are conversely synchronized with the grooves as to yield a feeling of painful retrospection. Multilayered? Of course, but not to the point of sounding overwhelming or inaccessible to the average listener.
As far as production quality is concerned for “Favorite Scar,” this is a top to bottom gem that has a great polish nonintrusive of the harmonies and organic instrumentation in the mix. There’s nothing worse that running into a fat band of synthetic melodicism amidst an otherwise rustic and intimate instrumental backdrop, but for Susan Calloway, inviting that kind of a mess into her latest single wouldn’t appear to have even crossed her mind (or at least that’s how this finished product sounds).
https://www.amazon.com/Favorite-Scar-Susan-Calloway/dp/B08JG9PXXC You don’t have to be well-versed in the collective works of Susan Calloway to appreciate what she’s putting down here, but for those who are aware of her background and eager to hear what she can do in a nonrestrictive environment, “Favorite Scar” is a big turning point in the history of her professional life. She’s got competition coming at her from all sides of the American underground this fall, but if Calloway is going to be offering this kind of quality most every time she gets into the booth, I don’t know that her indie status will hold up for much longer as her exposure increases exponentially