Album Review: Imaad Wasif by Imaad Wasif

For anyone familiar with Imaad Wasif's other bands (Lowercase, Alaska!, the New Folk Implosion) or his work in 2006 as a touring guitarist with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, his debut solo self-titled album might come as somewhat of a surprise. Ditching the noisier electric guitars for softly played acoustic ones (nearly every song begins with a repeating, picked arpeggio), Wasif takes an ascetic approach to the record, happily immersing himself in an Elliott Smith-like self-denial and depression ("You can always find a friend to hurt you when you're down/And it's wonderful to be without," he nearly cheerfully admits in "Without," and "Coil," one of the closest things to a love song, has Wasif ominously singing "I have murdered in the dark just to be so much closer to you my love") with a clean tenor that sounds remarkably like Jeff Buckley's, though Wasif keeps his more controlled than the late singer generally did, sticking to sad, simple melodies of a few notes. However, Wasif's songwriting can't be compared to either Smith's or Buckley's.

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