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NATO, ROOMFUL OF FANS (Mighty Winooski Music, CD) -- Burlington
singer-songwriter Nato (aka Nate Orshan) was first spotted perfecting his pogo behind the
keyboard of his high school band -- The Lawyers won the 1984 Burlington Battle of the
Bands. After stints with '80s bands The Cuts and The Switch, Nato began developing his own
idiosyncratic thing and hitting the open mikes. His job as a bassist with Dave Keller
Blues Band this decade only served to develop multi-instrumental --and performance--
chops. Nato's second solo album, Roomful of Fans, is a culmination of many efforts,
some of them not self-evident: He wrote and performed all the songs, produced the tracks
(recorded and mastered, with engineer Matt McCarthy, entirely on a PC), did the graphics
and typesetting on the CD's 16-page booklet (the art depicts a bunch of fans -- the
air-cooling kind), and even formed his own mini-label and got his own bar code. Talk about
DIY. But all that work would be in vain if the songs sucked. I'm happy to report that
Roomful of Fans, while uneven, doesn't suck. Not even close. Nato's growth as a
songwriter is what shows up clearly here; his penchant for pop echoes that of Matthew
Sweet, without the rock bombast, Michael Penn, with more inventive instrumentation (I
really like the churchy organ on "Run Away," fer instance), and the witty Elvis
Costello, whom I suspect is a Nato hero. Melodicism here is abetted by mostly thoughtful,
personal lyrics and no small dose of humor. For the latter, check out the mambo-ish
"Bom-Bom," a ditty about mom lighting up for the first time -- and we're not
talking Virginia Slims. Nato possesses an unremarkable but elastic voice, which he uses
with unabashed expressiveness. Though he apparently prefers vocals au naturel, I
think some well-placed effects could have helped on songs like the heartbreaker
"Monkey," or the plodding morality tale "Putting Peace to an End" --
as they do on "From the Noise," a tune that shifts from dark to light and back
to dark, and is one of the most promising here. Nato is at his most singer-songwriterish
with the overlong. "Spies," a curious description of an enigmatic occupation
that inexplicably flops into a three-quarter time bridge near the end. The catchy
"Luiza" bursts into a ska beat on the chorus, while "Over My Shoulder"
is a funk-lite bit of toe-tapping syncopation. Roomful of Fans is a sonic pleasure,
with discovery in the details on nearly every songs. On the other hand, it combines almost
too many influences, resulting in a collection that could be considered impressively
diverse, or a mishmash. The good news is it suggests Nato will never run out of ideas, and
as his vision --and recording techniques-- continue to mature, his roomful of fans might
expect Beck-like sophistication to follow. Check out the pared-down version when Nato
opens for Miss Bliss this Friday at Red Square.-- Pamela Polston
SEVEN DAYS May 5, 1999
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