Ben Kweller - Sha Sha

Sha Sha might be the first solo album from twenty-year-old Texas-born songsmith Ben Kweller, but it’s far from his debut musical statement. As the front man of precocious grunge tykes Radish, Kweller was one of rock music’s youngest ever child stars--and what’s more, he had a few cracking tunes in him that put his kiddie peers in the likes of Silverchair to shame. After Radish disintegrated, Kweller spent the late 90s hanging out with artists like Juliana Hatfield and Evan Dando, and began work on a new set of songs that owed nothing to the ugly end of the grunge explosion and everything to the sun-kissed pop melodies and geeky emotional confessionals of mid-period Pavement, Weezer and The Lemonheads.

Kweller has no need to hang off the coattails of any of his famous friends, though--his grasp of guitar pop is totally instinctive, and sweetly accessible. Check the likes of "How It Should Be (Sha Sha)", featuring a cooing Kimya Dawson of NYC anti-folksters Moldy Peaches, or the splendidly naive emo crunch of "Commerce, TX", both of which demonstrate an impressive grasp of quiet-loud dynamics and the occasional tantrum-like flurry of raw emotion that would put the excellent Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes to shame. This is highly recommended.