Introducing: Carlisle Evans Peck
Electric Porcelain is a deeply personal record from local songwriter Carlisle Evans Peck. It could be classified as classical pop – it runs the gamut nicely between purely classical and orchestral pop/rock (while also dipping a toe into spoken word poetry).
To record Evans Peck drafted a nine-piece backing ensemble of classical musicians and vocalists. Despite the large group though, Electric Porcelain is startlingly intimate. The sound is lush and full in the way that songs recorded with string quartets can be, but what comes across clearest is Evans Peck’s intense individual pathos.
The album is partially the result of a series of heartbreaks, and in writing it Evans Peck describes how he began to “explore how [his] own queerness ran up against the still-dominant heteronormativity of our culture…[and] see how the stranglehold of internalized homophobia and masculinity, even eight years after “coming out”, was still pervasive within [his] own body.”
Listening to Electric Porcelain its pretty obvious that it has not been an easy road for Evans Peck – these are tunes brimming with melancholy, suffering, and pain. However there is a strength to it as well, as if by giving voice to his feelings Evans Peck is (hopefully) getting some catharsis and moving on. It certainly makes for a beautiful and transportive listening experience.
You can stream Electric Porcelain on Spotify and/or order from Carlisle Evans Peck’s website here.
— Jon
