Franklin Bruno – A Cat May Look at a Queen

Franklin Bruno is teaching and finishing a Ph.D. in philosophy at UCLA. He’s also pursuing a career in pop music with two solo albums and three discs with his band Nothing Painted Blue to his credit. And he’s a published poet. Now, plenty of folks out there can turn a phrase and string together a couple of amusing similes, but few can dazzle you with their intelligence and wit. Bruno is one of those select few, a wordsmith with the humor and insight of a Noel Coward or Cole Porter, and a melodic gift that’s just as strong.

His latest offering, A Cat May Look at a Queen, sports 13 top-notch tunes, loaded with a sass and class lacking in most modern pop, and like the icons he almost looks up to, Bruno is able to create melodies in a wide array of styles. “Tired of the West” is an anti-cowboy song, but it’s built on a beautifully haunting country-flavored melody. “I Blame You” is a jazzy bossa nova, a gentle but heavily ironic kiss-off to an old flame. And “Dossier” could be a lover mooning over lost love, or a stalker snooping through a stranger’s garbage, but again the melody is achingly melancholic. Bruno’s understated tenor and the band’s minimal arrangements make the tunes here sparkle with an minimalist acoustic elegance

Keep scrolling for more great stories.