Sean Della Croce’s “Rebecca Henry”

It all starts with a delicate harmony in Sean Della Croce’s “Rebecca Henry,” and for those who have been craving a more refined side of adult alternative pop this autumn, this singer/songwriter has exactly what you’ve been looking for in her new single. Croce circles the hook with a lot of reticence in her lead vocal, but the brooding undertow of her lyrics bleeds into the instrumentation as nothing else could. Rather than exploiting duality, she wants to create an affirming narrative through kinship, which is something missing from both the world and the greater genre of western pop music at the moment.

The compelling use of texture in this mix was definitely one of the first features to really turn me on in this track, and I like that the physicality of the harmonies is retained in the mix for the music video as well. I don’t get the impression from Croce that she’s particularly interested in establishing cerebral melodies through anything more than a postmodern backdrop, and her straightforward vocal delivery supports as much here. It’s not something I’ve seen a lot of in the output of her peers, which makes “Rebecca Henry” stand out all the more right now.

As far as the track on its own goes, there’s a non-invasiveness to the music that certainly feels comforting and reaches even deeper than the lyrics would have on their own, but the studio itself isn’t being utilized as a buffer between artist and audience; if anything, it’s a binder. So few of the singer/songwriters I’ve been following in Croce’s scene have the kind of discipline she does when she steps up to the microphone, and in a performance like this one, it’s even easier to appreciate her poetic clarity, given the total lack of frills coming between listeners and her message.

Tonally speaking, this has got to be one of the most present works from an artist in pop to hit record store shelves in the past few months, but it’s not offered to us in such an arrogant fashion as to feel tailored to the needs of the audiophile more than the casual pop fan. If anything, “Rebecca Henry” is a rare instance of insular indie pop themes translating with exceptional grace in a familiar, unfanciful framework, which is made even more potent and accessible to the audience via the humble attitude Crose has at the helm of the material.

Taking her folk influences and blending them with some contemporary themes that could lead to some very cosmopolitan statements if shaped in the right manner, Sean Della Croce’s sound is, at the moment, unmatched in terms of its originality amongst the players in her local scene, and I can imagine it getting even sharper with just a little more time and experience under her belt. “Rebecca Henry” is neither self-righteous nor self-aware, and yet it seems to have a better sense of its own identity than any other pop track I’ve heard lately, which is nothing to scoff at by any means.

Mindy McCall