Music:
Member Since: 6/8/2005
Band Website: toddstadtman.com
Sounds Like:
"Filled with pretty-pretty pop melodies, Stadtman's suitably sensitive boy vocals and a gauzy blend of acoustic and electronic layers'n'loops, at times it's reminiscent of The Style Council (circa "My Everchanging Moods", check out the second song "Something Less Than Tenderness") and Casiotone For The Painfully Alone. Or you might even imagine a lower-fi younger brother of David Sylvian (at least in comparison to Sylvian's most recent Blemish album). The songwriting of his more structured songs is seemingly inspired by the smart popsmith likes of XTC's Andy Partridge and Elvis Costello, while the less song-y ones are more along the lines of Dntel or something from the Morr Music label. A nice and sweet how-do-you-do!" - Aquarius Records
"It's not that Stadtman has created something entirely unique on Only I Can Save You — fans of the Magnetic Fields in particular will find this album comfortably familiar — but Stadtman's previous work has rarely sounded this self-assured. These 12 songs are as effortlessly catchy as those of pure-pop traditionalists like Fountains of Wayne ("I Don't Know Why She's Here" in particular is a small masterpiece), but Stadtman introduces plenty of oddball textures like the manipulated electronic voices that take the lead on "I'm Good" and neat arrangement touches like the horns that crop up occasionally on the appealing Barenaked Ladies-like bubblegum of "Talking Through My Mouth." Endearingly quirky and utterly charming, Only I Can Save You is a delight through and through." - The All Music Guide
"His warm singing evokes other proficient tunesmiths such as Robyn Hitchcock, Edwyn Collins, and Jazz Butcher's Pat Fish." - The Big Takeover
"I could see him being as popular as the Postal Service, since he fits pretty well into that genre of Californian bubbly, electronic Post Punk." - Under The Volcano Magazine
"Todd takes a unique, electronic slant on the traditional pop song, but his Tom Petty-esque vocals and weaving of different layers of sound make it dangerously listenable." - Is This Music? Magazine
"Stadtman croons post-modern, Prada-issue pop songs in a voice that recalls a young Bryan Ferry." - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
"His aesthetics are as alluring as can be: sleek, hypermodern clicks and whistles float around in classic Anglophile pop arrangements, buoyed by sticky vocal melodies. It's like Arthur Lee trapped in an IKEA showroom, or The Junior Boys waking up on Ray Davies's village green." - Splendid Ezine
"There is an electronic bent that may jar with its programmed rhythms and sounds, but the sharp ‘new wave’ (think: Elvis Costello, Squeeze, XTC) songs tend to make Only I Can Save You pretty much relevant (and hip) for the current modern pop scenesters." - Night Times
"He’s Notwist, but not negative." - Flagass Radio
"Can’t get the nerve to stop listening to all of those Lloyd Cole, The The, Elvis Costello, and Edwyn Collins albums? Then you must give Todd Stadtman a try." - Mystery and Misery
"Takes a simple XTC-like song structure and converts it into an adorable pop tune that basks in melody as well as originality. - Indieville.com
"Certainly, comparisons to Elvis Costello are justified - both artists use exquisitely crafted musical backdrops to showcase their melodic and clear vocals." - Left Off The Dial
"Let's say he makes 80s British pop (The Smiths, They Might Be Giants, The Wedding Present) as if it had just been invented." - aB Magazine
"Orange Juice, Lloyd Cole & The Commotions, Elvis Costello, Pale Fountains och Felt är namn som fastnar I min för stunden överbelastade hjärna på amerikanska Zikzak. - Ettnollett
"Some will say that Stadtman sounds like Morrissey. F*** them. He sounds like Lloyd Cole." - Jetbunny Magazine
"Der US-amerikanische Schmachtsänger Todd Stadtman vergleicht sich mit COSTELLO oder gar SINATRA. Ha!" - Realmusic.de
"Stadtman writes songs like some odd hybrid of Martin Gore and Elvis Costello." - Jetbunny Magazine
"At other times Stadtman's voice so evokes David Gedge's that you'd swear they were jonzin for a Wedding Present fix." - Tidal Wave Magazine
"Sounds like it was thrown together by a third-grader for a summer camp project, recorded on a Casio and mixed on a boom box." - Salt Lake City Weekly
Record Label: Prix Fixe Records
Type of Label: None
