Just as its Chester Brown-style cover portrait and Peter O’Toole-inspired title insinuate, Fastball’s Tony Scalzo takes a decidedly less traveled road with his solo debut. While the pure pop instincts that characterize his Austin trio remain at the forefront, My Favorite Year dims the lights to create a more subdued, wiser mood. His vocals are gruffer and the arrangements are scaled for pubs rather than radio. Opener “Love Lost” is a template for the album’s lyrical bent. Nevertheless, convincing hooks turn the post-breakup phase between hopeless melancholia and emboldened resolve into something hummable. Scalzo’s bandmate Miles Zuniga gets co-writing credit on “Ziggy,” an aural snapshot of the perennial club-dweller who can’t manage the transition from adolescence to adulthood. Hard luck ultimately gives way to the ethereal, psych-tinged waft of “Free World,” co-written with Zuniga and Spoon’s Britt Daniel. Most of Scalzo’s tales leave just the right amount of vagueness for listeners to draw their own conclusions.
This article appears in October 11 • 2013.
