Fulton

Shelby Nelson might have been involved with music in one way or another for more than ten years, but it was only recently that he made it his full-time profession after getting canned by the software industry. It was then that he decided to start Fulton, his solo project (after playing in and around Toronto as part of Gooder) and the result is Trapdoor In The Sun. This really is a solo project because Nelson wrote, performed, recorded and produced all the songs on the album. And it sounds remarkably polished considering it was a one-man project, but it does have that bedroom studio feel, with a reliance on keyboards and synthesisers to fill out the sound. The result is similar to White Town, or even a decaffeinated version of Pure. But the weak point is the lyrics, which try to address Nelson’s idea of song-worthy subjects, yet come across as simplistic and far too close to cringe-inducing. The classic advice of not quitting his day job doesn’t apply here, so all I can suggest is that Nelson maybe finds a songwriting partner who can help to compensate for his obvious weaknesses when it comes to words.