Two Gallants The Scenery Of Farewell

This 5-track EP features a more stripped-back, acoustic side of Two Gallants, the San Franciscan indie rock duo named from a James Joyce short story in Dubliners. The Scenery of Farewell was released on Conor Oberst's Saddle Creek label, and the music certainly sounds like it's been influenced by Bright Eyes and the other alt-country staples of the Nebraskan label. This works both for and against Two Gallants; Seems Like Home To Me and Up The Country are the highlights of the EP, rustic and ragged folk songs where the group sound excited and enthusiastic about their music, the latter featuring pedal steel guitar, and Adam Stephens' charming vocals cracking and breaking in all the right places. At other moments on the EP, however, the group can lapse into sounding like copyists; All Your Faithless Loyalties sounds like an offcut from Bright Eyes' I'm Wide Awake It's Morning, sadly without the conviction and heart of that record. This tendency to tick off alt-folk tropes without finding anything genuine within them is a problem which Two Gallants overcome most successfully on the closing song, Linger On, a piano-based, 8-minute epic where the band sound genuinely touching for perhaps the first time on the EP. 
 
Still, The Scenery Of Farewell gets better with repeated listenings and is a worthwhile diversion for Two Gallants; eventually, its true place is as a signpost for where the band may take themselves in the future. The EP shows promise, and with refinment of their influences and ideas, this side of Two Gallants could prove very rewarding on future releases.