Joshua Jesty - Finally, Joshua Jesty Will Be With You In A Minute

Joshua Jesty - Finally, Joshua Jesty Will Be With You In A Minute
2010, Joshua Jesty

Joshua Jesty returns with his latest collection, Finally, Joshua Jesty Will Be With You In A Minute. It's Jesty's most gimmicky work to date, a collection of one minute songs that run the gamut from breakup material to the truly bizarre.

Jesty opens with "A Minute Of Your Time" rumination on lost love where she's moved on and he has not. "She Won't Admit" is full of denial, positing about her feelings and explaining them away as requited but hidden. It's either part of the dance or obsessive behavior and is offered up here in a catchy/edgy (but brief) arrangement. "Skirt" finds Jesty wondering about a woman's willingness to show her legs but not to show her feelings in very straightforward fashion. "I Don't Wanna Know" is perhaps the best snippet offered here. He's still not over her and is fishing for any indication that he still crosses her mind. He's acknowledged he lost but is still searching for any scrap of hope to hold onto. The first four songs offered here, with the addition of "Any Moment Now" and the closing track "Find", would all be very interesting fleshed out into full-length songs. Jesty could craft a very convincing and appealing breakup EP out of this material.

The rest of Finally, Joshua Jesty Will Be With You In A Minute is purely for Jesty's own amusement. It's difficult to say whether fans will come along. "Freaky Sexy Clown Jam" leaps over the boundaries of bizarre and lands firmly into the territory of the clinically unsound, and "Mini Van Halen" clearly isn't. "Do The Mess It Up" and "I'm Your Man" are pretty much afterthoughts. "The Only Thing I Regret" has a sweet beauty to it, but it’s unclear whether there's anything more there to flesh out.

Joshua Jesty continues to push the expectations envelope with a collection of musical vignettes that is both maddening and gratifying. Jesty creates like an American Primitive, an artist with prodigious talent and creativity but no formal training or technical chops. Whether or not this is true I don't know, but it's the style in which he creates. The results here aren't as solid as Jesty's past work, but when you cut away the chaff the material that remains has all the earmarks of potential greatness.

Rating: 3 Stars (Out of 5)

Learn more about Joshua Jesty at http://www.thejoshuaweb.net/ or www.myspace.com/joshuajesty.  Finally, Joshua Jesty Will Be With You In A Minute is available from Bandcamp for whatever price you choose to contribute.  Yes, this means you can get it for free, but please make sure to support the artist in some small way as you are able.