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ThornBrain, the one-man project of Sacramento-based experimentalist Austin Scholl, shouldn’t be considered “good” by most standards, but that might just be its most successful quality. With fuzzy guitar levels low enough to expose the sensitivity of his home recordings, Scholl lets the involuntary humor speak for itself, but his own intentional punk mockery creeps out in the process. With literal songcraft that touches on topics from love ballad mockery to the short storytelling of failed roadtrips, Scholl’s zane is the forefront of his work, and his instrumental talent, however diverse, becomes secondary. His collection garage pastiche will translate with a very particular audience, but his creativity is audacious, and certainly avoids the usual.
