Release Date: February 25, 2014
Twin Forks’ debut, self-titled album is like a warm hug from a friend you haven’t seen in a while.
Mandolin player and vocalist Suzie Zeldin, bassist Jonathan Clark, drummer Ben Homola, and singer and guitarist Chris Carrabba (Dashboard Confessional, Further Seems Forever) are the working parts of this foot-stomping quartet from Boca Raton.
Influenced by classic folk, country, and roots music, Twin Forks is filled to the brim with bubbling, effusive love songs, and while it’s not breaking new ground, the albums’s familiarity is what gives it its spark.
Themes of falling in love, girls leaving, and getting them back comprise much of the record.
Opening track “Can’t Be Broken” begs to be accompanied by claps and laughter with its sweet-as-pie lyricism: “That’s a love that can’t be broken/That’s the sting of a heart cut open/That’s the thing about blind devotion/That’s a love that can’t be broken.” Zeldin and Carrabba’s two-part harmony throughout the album gives an additional dose of charm to their sound.
Track after track is designed to be sung aloud and swayed to.
Cheerful, infectious whistling kicks off “Cross My Mind,” a percussive song that can do nothing but bring smiles. Mandolin and guitar picking pervade the album, but are especially fun in this number, accompanying the chorus, “From time to time you cross my mind/Good company is hard to find/From time to time you cross my mind, so stay with my just for the night.”
Carrabba’s knack for emotion-filled songwriting isn’t lost with this group. Not entirely full of flowery fields, Twin Forks also has a touch of folksy darkness with lines like, “Whistle past the graveyard, even the dead deserve a song,” (“Back To You”) peppered throughout.
The album loses steam in the latter third; these last tracks lack the same star-quality and catchiness of the opening ones. Nevertheless, stand-out tracks like “Come On” are only found lacking when compared to the other songs on Twin Forks.
Slower and more somber, closing track “Who’s Looking Out” calls, “Who’s looking out for you/Who’s looking out for you now?” It hints that maybe the love sung about throughout the album went south, bringing yet another hint of the foursome’s affection for classic country, where happy endings aren’t guaranteed.
Twin Forks is enthusiastic and approaches being excessively delightful, but the band is too honest for the music to just be schmaltz. It plucks at heartstrings with every pick and strum of the mandolin. An outpouring of affection through folk and Americana, every song is one to clap, dance, and sing along to.
Twin Forks- Twin Forks tracklist:
- “Can’t Be Broken”
- “Cross My Mind”
- “Back To You”
- “Kiss Me Darling”
- “Scraping Up the Pieces”
- “Something We Just Know”
- “Danger”
- “Reasoned and Roughened”
- “Plans”
- “Done Is Done”
- “Come On”
- “Who’s Looking Out”
