Steve Tagliere – Trust Myself
In the mid-’90s, Steve Tagliere’s L.A.-based, Replacements-inspired band Gingersol created a buzz, but music-biz disenchantment led him to take a step back. On the home-recorded Trust Myself, he vents his frustrations and self-reflections in a compelling set of musically spare, emotionally resonant songs.
As the title indicates, Tagliere has maintained cause for hope amidst disillusionment. On the album opener, the appropriately titled “Breakthrough”, he realizes, after “too many new cooks deluding hard work,” that all “I need to do is trust myself.” One feels like an intruder into Tagliere’s soul-searching struggle between cynicism and optimism, the latter edging out victory with the album’s closer, the heartfelt “I Love You”.
Basically a one-man effort (Tagliere’s brother and Gingersol cohort Phil plays guitar and sings on two tracks, while Walter Salas-Humara drums on another), Trust Myself employs simple yet intriguing arrangements — a banjo here, a harmonica there — which add variety to the deliberately paced songs. Buzzy, distorted guitars gurgle up under his acoustic strumming, providing sonic layers to his soft-spoken, plaintive tunes.
Mostly, though, it’s Tagliere’s pop sensibilities that keep Trust Myself from becoming mired in dreary introspection. While he doesn’t build his hooks into big, radio-friendly numbers, songs such as the accusatory “Sold” and the nearly uptempo “A Little Danger” project a subdued catchiness. The lo-fi sound comes off like a stripped-down, less musically ambitious Sparklehorse, but Tagliere shows himself to be a talented musician who deserves some real studio time.