The Big East
Hungry Ghosts
(self-released)

A floaty “What Dreams May Come” starts The Big East’s newest Hungry Ghosts. From the start here we sense an Eagles-heavy vibe, especially with this tune’s slipped-back-in-the-mix slide and strong harmonies. “Across the Water,” another early tune, mines the same vibe (with more organ up front), but it’s a stronger tune. While “The Wild Life” (again, some strong harmonies in the chorus here) moves along, “Love Monkey” is the jaunty rocker I took to in these first few tunes. “Here to Now,” again featuring some nicely placed (and played) organ, is probably the most mature presentation here for me. It has a solid lyric about love lost and maybe gained, a soft, subtle production, and a judicious use of this band’s go-to harmonies. There are plenty of places on Hungry Ghosts where there is a little too much sameness of sound for my personal liking. A tune like “Muskoka Time,” while again presenting well-sung vocals and nice “oohs,” doesn’t go anywhere really and sounds too much like what has come before. But then the heavier “Too Far Gone” plinks along at a brilliant, steady pace (pure rockin’ Eagles here with some 80’s-MTV guitar rock thrown in), so maybe it’s just that I respond best when The Big East is rockin’. A big dramatic, atmospheric title track-to-nowhere ends this concoction. From way up in northern Canada, we get The Big East’s Hungry Ghosts.