All you need to know about BROWER’s new live album, LIVE AND CONTAGIOUS, is that it’s the last live album ever recorded. From the last live concert ever held –– ever.While we’re at it, note: LIVE AND CONTAGIOUS is a proper-recorded, fullband-represented, career-spanning glam-punk spree from the before times; emceed by WFMU’s Todd-o-phonic Todd in front of an unsuspecting, captivated and sold-out crowd back in March of 2020.Opening with the previously unreleased, live staple, and lead single “Heart Is Real”, the stage is set and souped-up for an evening of BROWER-brand revelry accompanied by Josephine (Josephine Network) on lead guitar, Hershguy (Dirty Fences) behind the kit and the “Dr.” Josh Hahn (Relic Room Studios) finessing the bass. You’d never know it, but BROWER’s previous album, BUZZSAWS, was a solo-recorded effort with Nat Brower playing all of the instruments and engineering it by his lonesome. That material benefits here with the fleshed-out band for maximum #BROWERPOWER.Reenergized and urgent, the set showcases a brimming range of voices and sonic melodies abuzz and anew. “Hacksaw,” “My Father’s Name Was Cat” and “Real Girl” were meant to be heard this way! A deeper dive culls more reflective tracks from BROWER’s Little Big EP (“Birth” and “Glad Yr Here”) that sound fully realized and familiar in front of the rapt crowd. Brower, himself, gives the performance of a lifetime — little did he know it’d be his last...This is the sound of BROWER in the face of calamity and against the test of time; all you have to do is close your eyes and listen to return.
