String Bone – Wow! Oh Yeah! (2021)
Drawing together elements of folk, rock, funk, pop, grunge, and pretty much anything else you can think of, String Bone is breaking boundaries with his refreshing sound. The brainchild of Canadian singer-songwriter Barry James Payne, String Bone has been releasing music for over a decade – does that make him a veteran artist? Not sure, but he certainly knows what he’s doing. Using tender arrangements, his material is profound, intriguing and entertaining. The latest release from this talented musician is ‘Wow! Oh Yeah!’
Following on from his tracks ‘Waitin’ For My Dyin’ Day’ (read our review here) and ‘Ain’t Life A Brook’, String Bone releases the upbeat, toe-tapping single ‘Wow! Oh Yeah!’. Moving from folk and gospel-inspired tracks with a more intimate intensity, the new track incorporates funk, blues and rock in a melting pot of sound. Hyper and slightly frenzied, but in a fantastic way, the melody pushes you into a kaleidoscopic sonic swirl with a jovial tone. My favourite part of the arrangement when it comes to instrumentation is the interspersed sax solos. It adds obscurity which is only intensified with the powerful backing vocals and String Bone’s gruff voice.
As I mentioned, String Bone’s material is profound and possibly controversial as he looks at modern-day society in ‘Wow! Oh Yeah!’. String Bone shares that “…we’ve created a pretty fucked up society from the capitalist money construct keeping people slaves to corporate overlords to the useless leaders in government who are bought off by the corporate overlords. Something has to give, and it’ll take a miracle. This song offers up some thoughts on the subject.” Using a stream-of-consciousness speech narrative, String Bone really brings the reality of the situation to listeners in a fun, thoughtful way.
So, what’s my verdict? Fun, lively and jovial, one would imagine the track to be light-hearted; however, the juxtaposition of significant content within the upbeat-ness makes it a little heavy. Overall, I like it. I mean, I really like it and hope to hear more of this eclectic style from String Bone in the future.
For more from String Bone check out his official website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Spotify.
