Review: Bruno Bavota - The Secret Of The Sea

Ultimately the album is a transcription of sadness, and the melodies flow forth in continuous cathartic evacuation via tunnels of piano and guitar; rising and weaving in momentary hope, resting upon minor keys that resonate with a solemn acceptance of feeling melancholic and ill at ease. If there is a thread of optimism, it’s the confidence with which The Secret Of The Sea declares itself, as though Bavota has only just stumbled upon the language required to draw out the contemplations that brew within – a lot of the piano keys are emphatically slammed, like a fist on a table upon a flash of realisation. Sadness flows outward, released into the sea and the sky.

Most prominently, I am drawn to the specks of structure and activity in the background; the drones that glimmer intermittently like the scan of a lighthouse beam, or tiny people propped up on the smooth undulation of a hillside. It’s these modest details that gift a distinct aftertaste to an experience that is otherwise classically romantic, alluding to narratives weaved within the explicit memories of couples falling in love on a beach at midnight, or an amber sun dipping beneath the rippling horizon line; postcard memories fading into the present as it folds over and over again. At the foreground are the simple, homely gestures that decorate the universal language of love – the brushing of hands, an arm placed gently upon the back – which manifest through piano chords whose simple intention glows as pop sensibility. Phrases and motifs recur again and again, like whispered utterances that liberate the thought behind them.