Collating his past two EP’s, Ben Wright Smith pulls together years of work in the beautifully acoustic and soothing Echo Lodge.
In a stream of songs dating back to 2018, indie artist Ben Wright Smith strings together the echoes of his past work along with new projects in his album Echo Lodge.
The incredibly multi-faceted and talented artist delves headfirst into the emotion behind each song. His humbleness and passion bleeds through the lyrics as the Melbourne-based singer ties years of songwriting into one body of work.
Wright Smith created Echo Lodge to reflect his underlying connection with the music community, standing on the hinges of honesty and rare genuine nature.
With older songs such as Tomorrow Never Comes and Volcano God Head Explodes, blended with new tracks Seedpods and New Breeze, there is a utterly calm and free flowing feel to Echo Lodge.
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The album begins with the tune of Wright Smith’s Storm Boy, a nostalgic 2018 classic that sets the tone of the project, acoustically soothing with each guitar strum radiating a golden heat.
From there, Echo Lodge continues to grow, each song embodying Wright Smith’s captivating and dreamy tone. Homesick, the calmest piece on the album, slows the pace down to the halt of a hypnotic state, showing off Wright Smith’s calming voice, similar to the likings of Iron & Wine, utterly timeless and soothing.
New Breeze, adds another layer to Wright Smith’s musical talents. What was intended to be a simple folk song, turned out to be a “spooky, sci-fi space waltz” the artist describes.
Accompanied with a chaotically strange music video, involving a literal floating head chasing a distressed couple in their home, the songwriter continues to be a calm and consistent ray of light as he sings; “we’re running, running, towards what we are becoming, keep running”.
Wright Smith reminisces on the concept of the video; “When we first came up with the idea we couldn’t stop laughing at how dumb it was. Basically we trashed my place with leaf blowers and tried to imagine a floating head chasing everyone around.”
The final song on the album, Physchotropical Brainstorm uniquely nourishes the soul, leaving you with the echoes of the artist’s past and present, with an anticipation for the soothing songs that will inevitably follow in the future.
My album was inspired by psychedelic drugs and heartbreak! Thanks for the re-tweet ;)
— Ben Wright Smith (@benwrightsmith) February 24, 2021
Whilst the songs were written and recorded at different times in the artist’s career, each piece manages to coincide with the other, creating a honey-like flow that is almost too easy to consume.
Wright Smith recalls that; “even though I’ve been releasing the music as we’ve been recording it, it’s nice to hear it all as an album now. In the end, it all just melts together.”
Check out Ben Wright Smith’s album Echo Lodge for your calming pleasure and catch him live at the Melbourne Brewers Festival Saturday 17th April.
