You're a Good Person by Anton Donovan
- Arashk Azizi
- 13 minutes ago
- 3 min read
Anton Donovan’s new EP, You’re a Good Person, lands with the kind of theatrical flair that feels both self-aware and devastatingly sincere. A classically trained musician with roots in improvisational comedy, Donovan has always balanced satire with confession. Here, he leans into that duality with a jazz-inflected orchestral palette: brass sections that swell like Broadway overtures, strings that sigh like chamber music in disrepair, and a lyrical voice that reads like a series of unmasked monologues. It’s cabaret rebuilt with contemporary classical sensibilities. Part musical, part fever dream, part diary read under low lighting.
The title track, “You’re a Good Person,” sets the emotional and aesthetic blueprint. Over orchestrations that shimmer between big-band swagger and symphonic drama, Donovan delivers a character study of someone who “parcels out myself and sell[s] it for sticky coins,” endlessly giving, endlessly overlooked. The repetition
"No one ever said it was easy to be such a good person”
becomes both mantra and indictment. He exposes the transactional rot beneath performative generosity, turning the refrain into a mirror that flatters no one. It’s a pointed, darkly comic opener, the kind that sticks in your mind long after the brass fades.
If the first track pokes at martyrdom, “Your Thesis Made Flesh” dives headfirst into intellectual lust. It’s the EP’s most unhinged and exhilarating piece of writing, an erotic academic meltdown couched in dense imagery.
"Panelists in my brain debate Socratic,”
he mutters, before the entire lyric descends into philosophical carnality. Donovan weaponizes language like a blade:
“self-discipline’s a cock ring, scholar of the obscene, I’ve mastered the moan in iambs.”
It’s wicked, literary, and delivered with a big-band score that feels ready to implode. Classical music blogs and contemporary classical listeners who crave boundary-pushing composition will find plenty to chew on here.
With “Back When It Mattered,” the EP shifts from provocation to bruised nostalgia. The lyrics unfold like a novella of misaligned loves, cross-continent breakdowns, and wounds that never quite close:
“I miss your voice like I miss myself back when it mattered.”
The arrangement is more restrained with bass and later piano chords leading the way. This track ties the EP firmly into the lineage of narrative-driven indie music promotion and would sit comfortably on playlists seeking emotional weight or late-night reflection.
“The Adjusted American” skewers self-help culture with vaudevillian charm, its jazz swagger underlining a portrait of a society addicted to “twenty-four-hour breakfast” and “hearts in Tupperware.” Meanwhile, “Hell Doesn’t Care” trades satire for existential grit, stepping into a darker, near-ritualistic mode:
“Heaven’s a mask / but hell doesn’t care.”
Its diminished piano chords start the piece in a mysterious mood, the trumpet breaks in and finally a harmonic resolution that leads to vocals.
The EP closes with “I Love Halifax,” a riotous, affectionate hometown rant delivered with comedic timing sharp enough to cut steel. It’s spoken-word cabaret backed by brass, piano, and guitar that feel ready to burst, a love letter written in potholes and sideways rain.
Across You’re a Good Person, Donovan proves he doesn’t write songs so much as build theatrical spaces. His orchestrations are bold, his lyrics scalpel-sharp, and his persona singular, half penitent, half provocateur. For listeners browsing music reviews online, this EP is a reminder that originality still gets noticed.
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