In 2019, burgeoning Alaskan singer/songwriter
Quinn Christopherson
won NPR's popular Tiny Desk Contest with the passionate "Erase Me," a song that reflects none too happily upon his newfound male privilege after transitioning. That anguished, electric guitar-based song serves as a dramatic album highlight as it closes a set of largely self-examining tracks that navigate nostalgia, gratitude, and solitude for his full-length and
Play It Again Sam
debut,
Write Your Name in Pink
. Slightly favoring keyboard-and-drum-machine tunes on the whole, the album was produced, recorded, and mixed by
Nathan Jenkins
, who, along with longtime
Christopherson
collaborator
Nicholas Carpenter
, co-wrote some of the music. As main lyricist,
pays tribute to
Carpenter
and life on the road on "Take Your Time," a trudging midtempo track in A-A-A-A form that gradually adds layers of shimmering keys, a repeated guitar riff, and ghostly backing vocals to appreciative, repeated lyrics like "Take your time walking to the stage/This is our job now." A more anxious outlook comes into play on the synth poppy "Uptown," which dwells on the words "I don't like who I am," and on the spoke-sung "Neighbourhood," which plays like a diary entry (and then recorded phone message) underscored by humming synths. Reflective and intimate throughout, with murmured melodies, the few relatively more extroverted moments include "True Friends," whose '80s pop sheen is accompanied by steady beats, and the similarly affectionate "Celine," a song inspired by his mother's fondness for
Celine Dion
on karaoke nights. With their similarly glistening palettes, these brighter moments blend in with the more somber mood of the rest of
, a candid document of struggle and shifting identities that liberally credits loved ones for helping him through it all. ~ Marcy Donelson