Portraits Of Tracy Releases Ambitious New Album "Drive Home"

Drive Home is the 18-track new album from Portraits of Tracy, a collection of both ambitious cinematic breadth and sprawling poetic intensity. One that fervently wrangles all of Couren Bowman’s eclectic musical influences and artistic theatricality into a visceral collage of scenes and intimate confessions. Interspersed by spoken-word monologues, brief skits, and voiceovers that loosely narrate moments in the life of the artist’s alter-ego Junie.

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After the ethereal crescendos of the opening track “Lost!” (which has to be a Coldplay allusion, given the way Couren included the band on an Instagram post listing his influences) and skit “8 Minutes,” the album kicks off with the barn-burner “Aeternum.” It’s the first of the three tracks that make up the setlist mentioned in “8 Minutes” and serves as both a fiery introduction to Junie’s meteoric persona.

But even as you revel in the track’s kinetic swagger and incisive introspection, each song peels back further the masking barriers between artist and audience. “En Garde” explodes raucously as they flaunt their ferocity, while synth-dreamy “The Party” swirls surreally into the intoxicating melancholy of the crowd.

The story of Junie continues on “Parking Lot” where he’s found drunk and riffing new lyrics in an empty lot at night — before gunshots ring out sending them homeward. This leads to the ecstatic “Home” with its scintillating sonic textures and luminescent piano backing that leads right into a heartwarming skit “Ten Years” which sees Junie returning home after over close to a decade.

The rest of the album unfolds in an intense dramatization that ends with Junie confronting the remnants of familial trauma and the consequences of revealing your feelings on “Forbidden Fruit.” All of it culminates in an emotionally eviscerating ending that punctuates the album’s already fiery soul with a grim honesty.