Songs from Your Childhood by Lucy Papachristou The moment the first few bars of “Secrets,” the opening track of this breathtaking EP by Jack + Eliza, hit my ears, I was immediately transported back to a humid summer’s night in mid-July, 2003. I spent that day with my mother, my mother’s closest friend, and her three kids. We spent that day like most other Saturdays when I was growing up: in Central Park, scrambling up the big mound of boulders off 97th street, eating a picnic lunch of deviled eggs and pickles, playing catch in the field of patchy grass. But as darkness began to fall, we lingered, feeling the pleasant ache of our tired bodies as we lay in the cool grass. Then the fireflies came out. Glass jars appeared out of nowhere (my mother knows what I want to do before I do), and we spent the next hour in complete ecstasy - such ecstasy only children will ever know - as we caught firefly after firefly. Each of the five songs on Jack + Eliza’s debut EP No Wonders acts as sort of time machine, taking the listener back to those most precious moments of childhood in a way that only music can do. Yes, yes, this is probably the most clichéd phrase ever used to describe music, but in the case of this EP, it really is true, at least for me. Much of this stems from the band’s backstory. Jack + Eliza are a duo from New York City consisting of two college sophomores, Jack Staffen (NYU) and Eliza Callahan (Columbia). By the time they were both in kindergarten, Jack was already singing and playing piano, while Eliza was nearly proficient in classical guitar, having started learning when she was three (I mean, come on! When I was three I didn’t even know what a guitar was). The two met when they were fourteen, when Eliza joined Jack’s band as a fill-in drummer. They’ve been joined at the hip as friends and songwriting partners ever since. So even thus far, this band has got a lot going for me personally. They’re almost my age. They’re from New York. It doesn’t sound like much, but if you add the fact that I actually met Eliza a couple of years ago, my attraction to this band’s work makes a lot more sense. It was my sophomore year of high school, probably the toughest year of my life so far. I was a total emotional wreck; earlier that year, I’d ditched all my friends, I hated my school with a burning passion, and I felt disconnected from everyone around me. Typical adolescent shit. So it was in this utterly despondent state of being that I was dragged unwillingly to a Passover Seder in Brooklyn one night in April. I was in a sullen mood as usual, and I became even angrier when I looked and saw a room of only fifty-year-old New York intellectuals (a.k.a. my parents…). But then
my mother’s now ex-boyfriend introduced me to the daughter of his best friend. All he told me was that her name was Eliza and that she was a year older than me. My first reaction when meeting her was that my knees started to shake uncontrollably. She looked so damn cool. You could tell just from the way she held herself that she was an incredibly self-possessed and mature fifteen year-old. (It was around this time that Eliza won the John Lennon Songwriting Contest; she is the youngest winner in the contest’s history.) We stood at the fringe of the boring grown-up party and talked non-stop for the next hour and a half or so. I shyly asked her a few questions about herself, what classes she liked at school, what she was interested in (music). Mostly, though, I talked to her. I babbled on and on about how unhappy I was at my school and my lack of friends. It must have been incredibly dull for her, this poor girl who had to listen to the lame problems of some random kid. But she looked me in the eyes the whole time, asked me thoughtful questions that demonstrated to me that she was actually listening, and laughed at my pathetic jokes. It was one of the best conversations I’ve ever had with a peer. I wanted to mention this story because I think it really influenced how I approach this band and this album. The five songs on this EP, each one thoughtfully constructed and steadfastly mature, remind me so strongly of being a child. Of being young and carefree, of catching fireflies in the Park. Jack + Eliza keep it wonderfully simple: their understated, intertwining guitars play softly in the background, allowing their gorgeous vocal harmonies to take center stage. Their songs are reminiscent of The Beatles and the Beach Boys (both of which they cite as major influences), but their music is far from derivative. There’s a bit of a hipster, indie vibe going on here (especially in their music videos, which look like old family movies from the ‘60s and ‘70s), but not annoyingly so. Jack + Eliza aren’t trying to prove their coolness to you. They just are cool. The song “Hold the Line” is probably my favorite on the album. Their vocal harmonies here are just flat-out fantastic, natural and spontaneous. The song sounds familiar, like a distant, almost-forgotten memory from your childhood. You’ve heard it somewhere before - you must have. This universality is the crux of Jack + Eliza’s genius. You are mistaken in thinking you’ve heard it before, because this band is anything but unoriginal. Rather, these are the songs you’ve been waiting for, the songs you’ve been singing in your head all your youth. And now Jack + Eliza are giving them voice, brave and spectacular voice.
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