Bart Graft - Modern Life

(Playmaker Media 2018)

Bart Graft hails from the Mitch Murder side of synthwave, both in musical and aesthetic terms. His music is similarly tongue-in-cheek, exploring '80s executive yuppie culture with FM tones and a sort of maximalist approach to composition--which you might call "executive synth." 



If you are attracted to that approach, then you will enjoy Modern Life. It reflects Bart Graft's skill as a musician and features a lot of high-flying guitar and synth lead solos. It is almost like prog rock or jazz fusion in a sense, if those genres were filtered through a retrowave lens. Frank Zappa also springs to mind.

Unfortunately, for me, I have very limited tolerance for prog rock, jazz fusion or Frank Zappa. Throughout Modern Life, I found myself appreciating the compositions and musicianship without actually enjoying the experience of listening to them. So this is one of those tough albums to score, where you recognize that it is done well but it just isn't for you. My score reflects both of those things.

Score: 6.0