Mary Broadcast’s new EP Panic ventures into areas few other songwriters dare to go. The six track release conceptual release tackles the miscarriage and aftermath for a young couple, focusing on the mother and her personal journey. It isn’t your typical concept release, the wont for most producing such works is typically not so raw and personal, but Broadcast has ambition to burn.
URL: https://marybroadcast.com/
Panic is a multi-media release. The EP’s six tracks are paired with six videos, “episodes”, illuminating the story with plenty of style and substance. Opening a release with its title song is, traditionally, a sign of artist confidence and the opener justifies such conceit. Broadcast works with the same band throughout the EP, they helped co-write the release, and their chemistry is obvious from the outset.
There’s no question this material has been well-rehearsed and planned out; the evidence of the care taken with this release leaps out at you. Broadcast’s voice leaps out at listeners, as well, without ever allowing her artistic control to lapse. She juxtaposes her voice against a thoroughly modern arrangement and the backing vocals, courtesy of Barbara Schutting, Sebastian Thon, and Mario Mrazek, further strengthen the track.
Despite the planning, however, it has raw and unvarnished immediacy. Both Broadcast and her band mates sound like they are performing for their lives. This same sense of connection with the material and audience continues with the second track “Zone 4”. It is one of the EP’s unquestionable highlights. Broadcast and the band turn up the dramatic intensity to dizzying heights and actress Clara Diem scalds the screen with her wordless yet profound performance. She captures the wide-eyed emotional heat of the material.
“Bastille” is hard-driving, rousing pop with ample intelligence. Andreas Senn’s drumming never overwhelms listeners while setting an authoritative tone. Broadcast and the band, guitarist Jimi Dolezal, Thomas Hierzberger on bass and synths, and Senn on drums, handle the production duties for the release. It’s obvious they have a shared vision for the EP’s sound and it comes through quite strong here. Diem’s performing counterpart, Klemens Dellacher, returns for this video and matches the exultant quality of her performance.
“Sing It” takes the EP’s musical sound in a slightly different direction. There’s more clutter here than we hear in earlier tracks, it’s a little darker, but shares much of the same core template powering the other material. It’s difficult not to love the emotional tone Broadcast’s vocals achieve each time out and her biggest strength is versatility. Her subtle yet effective shifts in delivery from song to song is an appealing part of the EP’s overall presentation.
The last track “Aver” puts an emphatic exclamation point on the collection. Many listeners will notice and admire the even-handed manner Broadcast and her collaborators utilize with such heavy material. This could be a dire and despairing experience, but Panic avoids that. Much of the credit for this lays at the feet of the video “episodes” released alongside the songs; it widens the narrative’s dimensions and involves listeners deeper in the story. Mary Broadcast’s latest release is one of the sharpest and fully-realized in recent memory.
Jodi Marxbury