Brian Charles Tischleder is a musician based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. On August 5th 2021, he released a brand new album titled “This Town” featuring music inspired by the fight against historical racial injustice and civil unrest in Minneapolis during the summer of 2020. We took a listen to the track “I Can’t Breathe” and what did we think? Here goes!
The track begins with a few repeated notes on the piano before heading right into the song’s form. There aren’t that many lyrics, which are some of the last words uttered by the late George Floyd, moments before his murder. Musically speaking, the lyrical content and context versus the music as a whole doesn’t really capture the feel of the pain and anger such an event released. While there is an air of edginess and some level of depth, it seems to be a mismatch between the two compositional elements. Indeed, while the music is exceptional – the subject matter doesn’t match. We’d imagine for such a topic, something heavier, slightly angrier would have suited better.
Despite the above, as it stands – the music is pretty solid otherwise. There’s ample breathing room even with the saxophone parts, though the piano at times seems overbearing but we’re not sure if this is part of some artistic impression of the aforementioned event. While we did say there was a mismatch of emotion between the lyrical and musical parts to this composition, there is a, slightly present, air surrounding the subject matter as the song goes along – could have gone further. It also sounded to us like there was great care and attention in the mixing and mastering process which pays off somewhat.
Overall, a very ambitious piece of music which fell (to us at least) slightly short. Every musician/artist will naturally attempt to convey their own thoughts and feelings towards certain events and it is entirely subjective as to how it will be perceived. For us, this didn’t – but for you? Well, make up your own mind – its certainly worth a spin or two.
Listen to “I Can’t Breathe” by Brian Charles Tischleder on Spotify. Be sure to follow him on Facebook, Twitter and be sure to check out his official website!
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