Zaq Baker's "This Time It's Personal" Review
This Time It’s Personal. Zaq Baker’s newest album is all about personal revelations, and it’s brimming with personality. Where past albums had more about storytelling, Zaq’s focus is on self-reflection here. This album is emotive musically as well, with a lot of the songs having a heavy focus on Zaq and his piano.
While the music here is played close to the heart, it is still complex and varied. For one, Zaq’s skill at the piano is unmatched. You can tell that Zaq is well acquainted and able to use the piano as an extension of himself to convey the feelings he needs to share. Outside of that, Zaq is accompanied by strings in much of the album, which add another layer of emotion to the moments they’re in, and they feel cinematic or theatrical as well.
Zaq covers several topics in this album relating to confessional elements of his life. For one, we have the stress and depression of everything that has happened in the last few years with The In-Between Years. Meanwhile, 20 Elephants covers the things that we don’t say that maybe we wish we did. Someone To Believe In starts out seeming like a love song, or a budding relationship, but then moves on to discuss the idea of leaning on others or looking for validation in others vs. the self. The final twist of Someone To Believe In is that the person really worthy of that love and validation is himself, which is a touching moment and a good message. There are several times Zaq relates his experiences with depression and mental health problems covered throughout the album, but especially in Chiaroscuro, I Am A Weed, and The Great Exaggeration of Summer ‘19 - Postlude. These songs feel like they were hard to write, but needed to be written by Zaq, in the way that music can be a form of coping, from writing to performing.
A favorite of mine here would be The Great Exaggeration of Summer ‘19 - Postlude. It’s quite the title for quite the song. Something instantly draws me in with the opening lyrics of
“So you got burned, burned burned/
You put your heart into places, your heart into places.”
Something about these lyrics is captivating, and the tune of Zaq’s voice here is catchy and memorable. The song goes on to describe the heart and what it’s not, saying essentially that it’s not something we can just find temporary fixes for, but it is something that can change and get damaged. My favorite lyrics on this are also my favorite lyrics on the album:
“So you’ve got your demons/
We’ve got our demons too/
Well God I need a cigarette for everything that I’ve been through.”
These lyrics hit me in a way that I teared up when I heard them (something about “everything that I’ve been through” as well as the idea that cigarettes could fix it). And then Zaq immediately follows with the lyrics:
“Well God, I need a Gatorade for everything that I’ve been through.”
And these lyrics made me smile while still teared up from the past line. Zaq is balancing these heavy themes with moments of levity throughout the album. There’s the line “In the psych ward for the very first time” which itself evokes this conflicting emotion of darkness and ironic distance (something about that very). On top of this, Zaq sings and delivers these lyrics in a sardonic and campy vocal performance that sounds both like Amanda Palmer and a spotlight moment in a musical. Zaq himself cites Regina Spektor and Billy Joel as influences, both of whom strike me as very similar to Zaq’s style in the theatricality and oddball nature of the songwriting.
This is a good album to listen to on a long drive. It’s a good album to really listen to the lyrics, rather than something to have in the background, or something to party to. It’s an album that’s worthy of several repeated listens. It’s an album that asks you to reflect on it, and then reflect on yourself. When there are heavy and personal lyrics coming from heavy and intimate thoughts, there’s comfort in knowing you’re not alone in them. Zaq said as much himself in the interview: “The point is to not feel alone in that.” Zaq has shown his heart in this album, and he’s better for it. And I feel better for having listened to it, and now to share it as well.
Listen “This Time, It’s personal” By Zaq Baker on Spotify or wherever you stream your music.
