Who likes midterms? I know it's bad to make generalizations, but I'm going to have to go out on a limb and say the answer to this one is nobody. If you find yourself coming to the same conclusion I just did, then come to Cholmondeley's each Wednesday night in the near future for WBRS' coffeehouse series. Kicking off the program this past Wednesday was none other than Her Campus deemed Campus Cutie, and good friend of mine, Gabe Goodman '15.

Goodman got his start performing on the popular 90's TV show, Kids Say the Darndest Things, at the tender age of five. From his early and humble beginnings as a child with an acoustic guitar and a passion for music, Goodman has come a long way.

"If Gavin DeGraw and Frank Ocean had a lovechild that played with synthesizers, its name would be Gabe Goodman" writes KRuel on the blog Violent Success. That's pretty accurate, especially considering Goodman closed out his half-hour Chums set with a cover of Frank Ocean's hit "Novacane," but I think I'd change Gavin DeGraw to U.K. electronic artist James Blake. Like Blake, Goodman knows the secret recipe for combining electronic sound and live instrumentation into a dish much more satiating than either could accomplish alone. With Goodman at the helm, the two seemingly disparate musical camps complement one another effortlessly.

Armed with nothing but a laptop, guitar and his vocal cords, Goodman leapt onto the small Chum's stage before a densely packed crowd of friends, supporters and fans.

With his pompadour-esque hairstyle, vintage Hawaiian button-down and affable stage presence, Goodman evoked the style and charisma of rockers past. It is clear he was meant to be a performer. After a few kind words to the crowd, Goodman decided it was time to let his music do the talking.

The set started off with a new song, "Malibu," which was a display of Goodman's soulful guitar work as well as his mastery of production, evidenced by the various sample triggers and backing tracks he utilized. The crowd was still getting warmed up when Goodman decided to lay down one of his most impressive works to date, titled "Bent Fiction," off his most recent EP, Midnight Sour. "Bent Fiction" starts with a lone midrange squelch that immediately references much of the evocative, heads-down electronic music that is popular in the scene today.
Goodman plays the role of tour guide as he leads the crowd up his mountain of sound. Instead of the various components rushing in together, Goodman points them out layer by layer-the bass booms, the chord stabs and his own impassioned vocals-as the audience follows his ascension to the summit, where everything comes together in a way that proves the whole is in fact greater than the sum of its parts. However, the sound is not smothering. It is something exceedingly breathable, which Goodman demonstrates as he lurches back and forth on stage, losing himself in the mammoth dynamics of his sound.
Sometime toward the tail end of the show, Goodman broke a string but still managed to finish the song on a high note before he hopped off stage momentarily to get his backup guitar.

After playing through a healthy chunk of his own music, Goodman answered an audience request for a cover with a song by none other than contemporary R & B prodigy, Frank Ocean. The song, "Novacane," is a risky one to perform for most people, as it is a relatively new tune and belongs to an artist who is undeniably a master at his craft.

This was no karaoke affair either; Goodman radiated nothing but confidence during his rendition, and easily made the song his own. It would be foolish to try to emulate Ocean's high-register vocals, and Goodman knew this as he transformed the song to fit his own unique breed of pop-tinged electronic R & B.
Within 30 minutes, Gabe Goodman leapt onto the stage, fired through seven tracks, and then he was off. In this small window of time, Goodman painted a vivid portrait of himself as an artist.

From epic moments of catharsis during "Bent Fiction," guitar-driven pop melodies on "Physical Education," and his closing cover of "Novacane," Goodman hit all his strong points and provided something beyond a study break for the students lucky enough to catch his half-hour Brandeis debut at Chum's.