Travis Bretzer

-

Hometown: Edmonton, Alberta
Lineup: Travis Bretzer
For fans of: Mac Demarco, Aztec Camera, Orange Juice
Key tracks: ‘Trying To Learn’, ‘Hurts So Bad’
See him live: Travis has yet to announce any UK dates
Connect: Facebook | SoundCloud | Twitter | YouTube

We can’t say we know a great deal about Edmonton, Alberta, other than it was once home to the world’s biggest shopping centre until those pesky folks at Beijing’s Golden Resources Mall put paid to the accolade in 2004. Step forward 23-year-old guitar wielding troubadour, Travis Bretzer, an Edmontonian intent on putting the city back on the map and even has a hazy ode to his “favourite spot in the neighbourhood” – you guessed it, the mall – replete with some charmingly silly visuals.

Frequently sporting a baseball cap, rolled up, worn out jeans and a wide mischievous grin, it’d be easy to shrug Bretzer off as one of many Mac Demarco copy-cats. Yeah the classic ‘stoner goofball type with an ear for melody’ image he puts across is similar to Montreal’s quirkiest export but the young pretender has actually discovered a distinctive voice of his own already.

On debut EP teaser ‘Trying To Learn’ – a title indicative of Bretzer’s self-deprecating manner – he drawls verses about feeling elderly in his youth with a sweet and hopeful air; not so much Mac, more like an embodiment of the C86 movement. The dual guitars – warm acoustic splashes over noodling Nashville pedal steel-ish riffs – recall the carefree pop proclamations of Aztec Camera and Orange Juice, albeit with Bretzer’s wiry North American twang supplanting ‘the sound of young Scotland’s romanticisms.

The guy just has an innate feel for indie-pop hooks (see ‘Hurts So Bad’), so it’s no surprise New York indie, Mexican Summer – former home to indie darlings Kurt Vile and Best Coast – snapped up Bretzer’s first record, Making Love, for release on 23 July. Forget the food courts and GAP megastores, Edmonton has a new jewel in their crown.