Cooper Hyde - Casual affair

Cooper Hyde

Casual Affair
self-released; 2016

3.5 out of 5

By Santiago Garcia

This album, titled Casual Affair, is the project of Cooper Hyde and Sara Nagy. The guitarist and singer found an excellent complement to each other and created a versatile and classic sound. This album moves listeners through a mirage of different sounds, from rock to smooth jazz to acoustic ballads, and is driven by the voice and lyrics of Sara Nagy. These artists mixed and recorded an album that is able to capture lyrical emotion right in line with a variety of genres and guitar sounds. 

This album starts with a smooth song called “Casual Affair” which sets an interesting mood. The song starts out with a slow, spacey guitar riff. The female vocals pop in soon after with a smooth and dark voice, which has a somewhat ‘90s rock feel. The lyrics are direct and emotional; they are feel good and complemented with a similar “feel-good” groovy bass line. The sound is raw and acoustic-like, but very clean. This track ends with an excellent guitar solo that moves fast, classic a good-ole ‘90s rock song. 

​The album has a great transition here, the second song, “Purple-Hued Boy” starts out slow and melodic. It moves into a louder, more in-your-face rock sound that carries on into the next few tracks. The song is vocal heavy and the lyrics move the listeners along the story. The guitars hop between different sounds or genres, and have a faster and more metal sound in the hook. The guitar solos do a sweet job complementing the emotion of the lyrics as if they were talking to each other, something they do really well in lots of the songs in Casual Affair. 

The album moves through to a couple of songs that are composed similarly and have the sound of the last song. The guitar introduction that starts out “In Denial” keeps up the tempo, and the guitar shreds another awesome solo at the end. The guitar moves into a new genre in “Gold Clothes” with an awesome smooth jazz guitar riff at the beginning. There’s a transition into a calmer sound, but the lyrics actually get more emotional. The sound has a more melodic, feel-good vibe and slows down the album a bit. 

Casual Affair is a project that does an excellent job encompassing a nice variety of sounds. The album eventually moves to a more acoustic sound, and then the vocals hit a bluesy feel at the end. The guitar riffs and solos makes this a really fun listen and add an awesome rock influence. This is one of those situations where a musician and a singer find a great rhythm that lets them create versatile and clean sounds.

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