Ari Hest

Sharing the stage with a Cy Young award winner is not something your average singer can boast. Ari Hest, however, can do exactly that. On a swing through San Francisco a couple of years back, Hest brought Oakland A’s ace Barry Zito up on stage with him to play a few of Hest’s trademark wrenched-heart tunes. Zito played acoustic guitar pretty well; almost assuredly better than Hest can pitch. Anyway, that wasn’t the first time I had seen Ari Hest, but it did serve to solidify his metaphorical M.O. – the permanently fixed heart on the sleeve of a regular guy.

Hest’s latest release—his first one on a major label—doesn’t stray from his established foundation. Many of the songs, like “Aberdeen”, “Holding On” and “Fascinate You”, are repeats from his 2003 release Story after Story. They are likeable but basic; and the fact that they are identical in tone and delivery to the last album may serve to frustrate the fans of his that are yearning for newer songs (there are more old songs on this disc than new ones). Luckily for him, his voice is once again rich enough for those fans to forgive the paucity of new material.

What makes Hest’s music ripe with amicability is its confessional veracity. Though he’s not the first to lament a lover’s sting or the prison of the human ego, Hest’s songwriting and delivery are real and honest. His New York City roots are not hard to spot—a few of his songs are set under self-imposed clouds in the Five Boroughs. The songs are collectively ones of pining and manic reflection, of a young man fighting his mental specters and wrestling with matters of the heart. Hest writes and sings what he feels, and as the listener we can identify with his feelings while the melody gets stuck in their head. The packaging is cotton-candy acoustic balladry, but the contents come across as actual and emotive.

The best song on the disc was “Everything Seems Wrong”. It describes a relationship “rough patch” exceptionally with Hest’s smooth voice delivering the bumpy message: “When will you come back to your senses?” The song avoids the usual songwriting pairing of heartbreaker/heartbroken and paints a more complex picture of relationships--where black and white can’t help but make gray, and no one is necessarily the bad guy.

General comparisons can be unfair in music, but in many cases are simply unavoidable. Ari Hest will remind people of John Mayer--no doubt about it. Now that his music is out nationally, his fan base will likely grow its share of starry-eyed young girls, but he should not be dismissed as a poster boy pasted to the inside of a junior high locker. Ari Hest has something to tell you, and it’s a pretty good thing to hear.