Over the past decade, Owen Beverly has written pop/rock songs for Howie Day, toured the U.S. with John Mayer, released a solo country album, and co-founded Shrimp Records with Shovels & Rope. Now the frontman of French Camp, he shows the full breadth of his songwriting — which encompasses everything from spaced-out Americana to dark electronica, often during the same song — on the band’s upcoming release, Odd Particle.
“I listened to a lot of Roy Orbison when writing for this project,” he explains. “Some of what we did in the studio was very true to that inspiration, but the record definitely took its own shape. The producer, Josh Kaler, has a knack for creating abstract sounds, so songs that had very humble beginnings ended up with complex personalities.”
The result is a genre-jumping record that mixes the influence of French Camp’s native Brooklyn — stylish, big-city indie rock and smart, synthesized pop/rock — with washed-out atmospherics stolen from the West Coast. There’s a bit of heartland rock & roll in there, too, the product of a career that’s taken Beverly all across the country in search of his muse.