Jordan Esker & the Hundred Percent: Fail To Learn Jordan Esker is a joy, and on Fail To Learn, the Bay area pop songwriter has found the best version of his sterling voice thanks to some help from bandmates plus local producers and at least one out-of-town guy (Daniel J. Goodwin — a Bob Weir collaborator who is responsible for the dreamy texture on Chicago dream-pop band Whitney’s 2016 album Light Upon The Lake). Together, Esker managed to find a way to blast all of his earnest and pleading into a headphones-required record that may be one of the most polished albums to come out of Tampa Bay in a while.
Scroll through a slideshow of 2018's best Tampa Bay music releases or see and sample all of them here. Call your local record store to see if it is carrying the release.
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This article appears in Dec 27, 2018 – Jan 3, 2019.