Owen is Mike Kinsella. After spending the past ten years in Cap’n Jazz, Joan of Arc, Owls, and most recently American Football, Owen is Mike’s next logical step.

The music of Owen is very much considered “Sad Bastard Music” (one of my favourite descriptions now, thanks Capt.) and usually is about some sort of broken heart.  Almost even considered angry while still sounding beautiful, Kinsella sings the things many of us are really thinking and you will hum along because you have to.  It takes a bit of a self awareness to speak such honesty, and if you mix it with sombre acoustic backing, you just may have the backbone of an Owen album.  I don’t mean to belittle anything, Owen is great and one of the first “Slowcoustic” artists that I ever really got into (members of the Last.fm group may remember tracks from Owen on playlists from 2,3 and possibly 4 years ago).

If you peruse his MySpace page, you will also find out he has a great sense of humour and that in fact, he is a real person.  I think he is the kind of guy you would actually want to know, if only to help you through another bad break up – just jokes…kinda.  He may also be a regular guy that just so happens to have more talent in songwriting/performing than we can ever hope to have.

Sometimes you just want to sit around and hum along to a some mellow indie-pop-singer songwriter and ignore the pomp and circumstance of the Academy Awards.  Yeah, now that is a bit better of a Sunday if I had to say.  Now, you have that chance with Owen in your life.

Check him on his MySpace Page and his Polyvinyl Page for more info and to pick up an album or two.  Also, don’t forget about his Daytrotter Session as well.

Enjoy.

~Smansmith