On Phantasmagoria<\/i>, Americana singer-songwriter Robert Francis uses his sister\u2019s collection of analogue synthesizers salvaged from the 2025 California fires as the \u201cbeating heart\u201d to express his folk narrative.<\/p>\n
The album\u2019s very first notes on the opener \u201cState Line\u201d are made by surreal synths that fade in, sounding as if they have been plucked right out of the opening credits of an Eighties low-budget sci-fi flick. When Francis\u2019 smoky vocals kick in, they have the profoundness of the likes of Robbie Robertson and Chris Rea, highlighted by gorgeously contemplative classic rock guitars played with the soul of blues and slickness of pop.<\/p>\n
This combination of fashionably dressed up, down-to-earth rock music with uncanny synths, which courses through the album\u2019s veins, creates a sense of space that\u2019s vast, and time that\u2019s slow, as if one is deeply lost whilst stargazing.<\/p>\n
But Francis also messes with the tranquility of this fanciful moment, as if actually transporting you into the depths of this weird and wonderful interstellar world that you were just gazing at. Francis\u2019 folky science-fictiony world gets even more interesting on the ensuing cut \u201cMidnight On Mulholland,\u201d where the bizarrely frenetic (and utterly angelic) chorus (that\u2019s almost like a different song in contrast with the calm verse) sounds otherworldly with Francis\u2019 \u201cphantasmic\u201d paper-thin vocals.<\/p>\n
“Phantasmagorical\u201d recalls the strangeness of early Peter Gabriel with its combination of odd singing and deep shadowy backing vocals, all held together by a complex rhythm. \u201cPan Pan (Port O\u2019 Call)\u201d gets weirder, where Francis\u2019 vocals, when sung through a vocoder, sounds extraterrestrial, with its \u201csea shanty\u201d words sung with a spooky singing cadence, and a rhythm with constantly shifting time signatures. \u201cEden\u201d too has an Eighties art rock appeal with its complex musical fabric and a dominating synth presence.<\/p>\n
While more straightforward tracks such as \u201cThe Mountain\u201d and \u201cWhen You Are Alone\u201d\u2014that tap into nothing more than Francis\u2019 Americana roots\u2014might sound more surface level classic rock in comparison, there is a contemplative depth to them that doesn\u2019t go unnoticed.<\/p>\n
Francis\u2019 very peculiar direction with this album of taking his heartland roots and tossing them into a world of synths that inhabit their own fantastical world feels neither gutsy nor self-indulgent; it feels just natural. His new musical direction not only works, but works spectacularly well, for at its core, his rootsy heart still beats strong making sure he never goes astray.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":35510,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[11197],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-47410","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-robert-francis","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=47410"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=47410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}