Darling Please

Chris Church

Big Stir Records

Neil Young’s music has been put into a college rock context many times, but as far as I know, not power pop, much less combining the two. That is one of the great things about Chris Church’s new album.

Recorded 11 years ago, and out in a newly remastered version by producer Nick Bertling, the quiet noise of this album shines through every time Church pays his guitar or sings about life and love. There is a lot of grit, but Neil Young is known for that. Church should be too. 

Darling Please is every bit as good as Youngs’s latest, Barn, a record also worth picking up. Play the two back to back and realize that Church and Young could be equals, even as their music is in different contexts.  But good ones, and I would say to start with Church, and then play Neil. 

Andrea Weiss