An argument is circular.
So, too, is Ramsey Thornton’s song about one. The chiming fingerstyle guitar, the jazz-educated percussion, and the vocal melodies of “Chase After You” double back on each other, never quite resolving. There’s a clear sense of a damaged relationship circling the drain, neither party putting in the effort to keep it afloat but neither walking away, either. Even the chorus is circular. “I don’t mean to make you cry / but aren’t I making a good point?” Thornton sings.
It’s poetic, in that Thornton is using the elements of the form to drive home the understated folk-fusion song’s thesis. And it’s like poetry in that it sounds intuitive until one listens a little closer to how intricately the constituent parts fit together.
I Called It is Thornton’s debut album as a songwriter, yet it arrives fully formed. As a jazz drummer, collaborator with Wilderado, and–perhaps most impressively–banjoist in Ken Pomeroy’s band, Thornton’s regular involvement in the Tulsa music scene expresses itself in the deceptively easy fluency of his playing and arrangements. Thornton plays guitar with the lowest string replaced with a high drone, yet the similarity to banjo ends there, as his fingerstyle guitar can evoke mandolin or even harp.
