Singer/Songwriter Ron Brunk Releases “Now Repeating”

Experimental music has evolved a lot in the last quarter century, to such a point where it plays a major influence over countless popular genres today. Ron Brunk, a singer/songwriter, gives us his take on a strain of experimental spoken word blended with stoic conceptualism in “Now Repeating,” and it’s an eyebrow-raising recipe without debate. Though Brunk isn’t a household name, nor does he have any major label money rolling out his ambitious content, he doesn’t let either of these facts stop him from putting on a creative clinic in his latest single, and in this elaborately stylized song, we get a look inside the artistry of a composer that isn’t usually afforded to us in such a commentarial release.

The tone itself in “Now Repeating” has as much of a story to tell us as the words in the track do, and the video doesn’t waste even a sliver of time before demonstrating just how evocative its emotional backdrop can be. While Brunk is speaking from the bottom of his heart and giving us as much emotion as he possibly can within the context of a single, the setting remains stone-cold, robotic, and a little hesitant in execution. To me, the verse represents that larger-than-life character taking the world by storm, begging everyone to look and see what’s going on in society’s epicenter. The spoken part itself, on the other hand, is the hesitant dissent; afraid to show us the full scope of their motivations for being here, and yet brave enough to have made an appearance in the first place.  

“Now Repeating” has an epic presence that makes me want to see Ron Brunk live at some point shortly. This piece feels like it was designed with the bright spotlight of a concert hall’s center stage in mind, and it has the flexible bones that an experimental performance would need to expand into a sprawling, unadulterated, and perhaps improvised summation mid-concert. I don’t think that this man should rush his craft though; it’s only through patience that the best artists of his genre have made their music into iconic juggernauts, and I believe that if he follows their lead, he’ll find similar fortune.   Last week, I wasn’t aware of “Now Repeating,” but after giving it all of my attention in the past six days, I intend to watch his development after the single finds its way to the right audience this season.

This is gearing up to be one of the most exciting summers in indie music that we’ve seen in some time, and if Ron Brunk can insert himself within the growing movement of rebels who are working to meld finer points with technologically sophisticated technique, then I think he has a good shot at putting himself, and his music, at the forefront of an important event going on in the underground right now. The face of experimental songwriters as we’ve always known it is changing, and songs like “Now Repeating” are, from where I sit, the wave of the future.

Mindy McCall