sxsw show review from high bias

Michael Toland of High Bias has given both our CDs good reviews, and went out of his way to introduce himself before our show. Nice guy. Here’s what he had to say, posted yesterday to LiveJournal:

New York’s Sharp Things have a couple of excellent, symphonic pop records out, but the band makes the kind of intricate music that would be intimidating to reproduce live. For most bands, anyway; singer/songwriter/pianist Perry Serpa and guitarist Jim Santo simply brought their 10-piece group (including three violinists and two brass players) to Friends’ tiny stage as if it weren’t no big thang. Serpa’s rich writing and dramatic singing betrayed roots in Broadway-style craftsmanship, but he and Santo knew how to arrange his creations to avoid both melodrama and complexity for complexity’s sake. It helps that all ten members took such obvious pleasure in playing lush, near-perfect pop songs like “Suicide Bombers,” “Don’t You Leave Me This Way” and a glorious take on the Beatles’ “Martha My Dear.” There was a lot of love on that stage, and the audience shared it.

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