Ryan Fisherman Photo: supplied
Ryan Chin played drums for the electronic outfit Doprah in 2013, and soon began developing his solo act Ryan Fisherman. He went on to loan his talents to a plethora of Christchurch bands, mostly behind the kit, but also on bass, guitar, and vocals.
His debut Vibe bore the fruit of those collaborations, as he enlisted Ben Edwards and twenty additional musicians to construct an ornate alt-country album. His follow-up Country EMO flips the script: this time it’s mostly just him. And while there’s still plenty of twang here, he edges away from the genre he started in, loading his compositions with different kinds of interesting noise.
‘Expanded’ has banjo offsetting a psychedelic lead that’s good enough to sub in for a chorus. There’s a whistling synth and acoustic strum, layers of instrumentation stretching into the background that part when Chin’s voice enters. Even though it’s slightly overdriven, it retains a certain softness.
It’s softer still on ‘Go Away’, a song which hides its virulent sentiment under a pillowy soundbed and lovely vocal harmonies.
“Eff your bro culture” is an unlikely line to anchor a chorus, but I’ve found myself singing along. It’s followed with “You’re such a punisher”, and a line about choosing to ruin someone’s life, and I can’t help wondering who this person is that Chin seemingly has to keep spending time with.
There’s a certain bluntness here that extends to a lot of one-word titles, and what they allude to is often not what you might expect. The track ‘Clearly’ unveils its full meaning in the line “I can't see clearly/ It weighs on me heavy”, but musically it’s buoyant and driving.
That track is particularly adventurous production-wise, stacking acoustic elements on artificial ones to create an invitingly hazy blend.
Anita Clarke added vocals to the album, and Ben Woods provided additional guitar and synth, with everything else engineered and played by Chin, who also produced.
It feels like the result of a precise vision, an excess of sounds that never tips over into chaos. On every track there’s always something interesting to tune into.
Enticing details dot Ryan Fisherman’s Bandcamp page, from family photos lining the background to giving a co-writing credit on his last album to ‘mental health’. Lyrically he can be downbeat - this does have 'emo' in the title after all - but musically it’s warm and inviting, always pushing into experimentation while staying largely within the margins of alt-country.
On the final track ‘The Tip’ another soaring guitar lead quietens as he sings “hope is a concept that works”, and, seizing on that moment of positivity, the album abruptly ends.
