From the looks of his body of work in general, there isn’t much that Davie Simmons isn’t willing to experiment with when it comes to making a strong emotional point in his music, and his new single “Traffic Disruptor” sees him grabbing hold of a beat like never before. There have been plenty of songs where Simmons has given everything to the microphone, christened a harmony with rich melodicism, but few where he’s worked the groove as hard as he does here. He’s letting the rhythm of the music enrapture us much as a lyric would and sounding much more controlled and on-point than many of his peers would with the same track.
You can’t deny that this singer/songwriter takes a lot of influence from the classic adult contemporary of the past, but much of the aesthetical foundations you might have heard in previous releases have been replaced in “Traffic Disruptor” with a stronger pop bend to both the music and his vocal than I was originally expecting. Simmons gets real with the harmonies here and doesn’t mind spreading out the catharsis in his hook as far as he can run it, which is often something his contemporaries just don’t dare to try – and for good reason, of course.
Our man jumps on this chorus like he’s catching the last train home at the end of a long night, but his eagerness to reach the peak of the song doesn’t end up taking us toward an inefficient climax. This song has some structural hurdles for even the most talented of singers to try and grapple with, but he doesn’t attempt any over-the-top virtuosity with his voice. He’s got some urgency behind his verses, but this is a singer who can stay calm and relaxed in even the highest pressure of arrangements.
I love the raw presentation of this song in both the studio cut and the music video, and it’s made me even more interested in hearing how Davie Simmons sounds in a live performance. He comes across as very off-the-cuff in something like “Traffic Disruptor” and I think he would carry forth much of the same presence he has here onto the stage if put in front of a receptive audience. If this player can work a crowd as well as he can a beat, then it likely goes without saying that he’s going to be around in this business for ages and more to come.
Impressive per the norm for this discography, Davie Simmons comes to the studio ready to do some serious work in “Traffic Disruptor,” and I think this song is going to become a fan favorite over time. It’s already one of the strongest listens out of his scene lately, and better yet, it pulls together some of the more eclectic artistic themes in the record in one singular place. If you’ve got an ear for soft pop melodies, you’re probably going to like this and the freewheeling creative edge it presents (as well as the man behind its creation in the first place).
Chadwick Easton