Emotive singer earns his Title

Looking for a band to quench your thirst for painfully personal pop? Leave your Dashboard and… Looking for a band to quench your thirst for painfully personal pop? Leave your Dashboard and Death Cab mix tapes at home, kids; it’s time for The Honorary Title.

Take the band’s latest single, “Everything I Once Had,” from last year’s album Anything But the Truth: “February, Valentine’s Day/Did my best to avoid the red cliches/So you dumped me on the subway – Everybody else is holding bouquets/Now I’m holding my face.”

Brooklyn native Jarrod Gorbel, lead singer and songwriter for The Honorary Title, may rightfully not be a fan of this month’s celebration of love, but tonight, his many fans can celebrate his music when the band plays at Mr. Small’s Theater in Millvale.

The Honorary Title is the brainchild of Gorbel, who began playing solo acoustic sets around New York under the moniker around 2003, while paying the bills by working at Diesel Jeans. He met bassist Aaron Kamstra through a mutual friend after a show, and soon the act was a duo. With the release of Anything But the Truth, the songs took shape with much more than just an acoustic guitar and an intensely passionate singer.

Though the band is often compared to like-minded emo mainstay Dashboard Confessional, don’t tell that to Gorbel.

“It’s a pain getting that comparison. I honestly feel that what I did was exactly the same before I ever heard his music. It comes a lot, though – I mean, it’s a guy with an acoustic guitar,” Gorbel said in a recent interview with The Pitt News.

So what does The Honorary Title sound like? Take your most secretive, personal diary entry. Now set it to a backdrop of gentle guitar strumming with some added country twang, touches of piano and plodding basslines with a melody that will creep up and haunt you for days. Let Gorbel sing it with his tortured, deep and rich voice. And just like that, The Honorary Title has a new song.

Though the band’s sound is often matched up with that of geniuses like Jeff Buckley and Ryan Adams, it is Gorbel’s storytelling lyrics that turn the most heads.

In “Frame by Frame,” Gorbel sings, “I share with complete strangers my most personal of pleasures,” and the line is undoubtedly true. With The Honorary Title, Gorbel has written songs about such familiar ground as breakups and broken hearts, but also ventures into less-worn topics like suicide. But whereas many songwriters would hesitate to expose the furtive highs and lows of their lives before an audience, Gorbel embraces the chance.

“It’s being able to feel uncomfortable again – to recapture the feeling of the moments that these songs are about. When it’s translated to the audience, it’s sincere. I don’t want to be on automatic pilot,” Gorbel said.

In this sense, Gorbel sees playing his story-songs live as nothing short of therapeutic – like being hypnotized and transported back to some memory, be it painful or happy. Anyone who has seen the band live is bound to agree; Gorbel can be seen writhing onstage, eyes closed with his mouth attached to the microphone as if held by magnets. But Gorbel had a different way to describe such therapy:

“After each show, if it’s a good show, I feel like I just got laid – tired, yet fulfilled.”

The band’s first headlining tour saw Gorbel and his crew driving the ubiquitous tour van all over the East coast last November, the closest show to Pittsburgh being in Erie. Tonight’s show at Mr. Small’s marks the first date of the second round of touring. The band will hit the road with label mates Limbeck, a hook-heavy country pop band, and Koufax, a band that plays danceable, piano-driven rock.

Though the bands will likely be seen mixing with the crowd after the show, don’t expect to see Gorbel before The Honorary Title takes the stage. His voice being his most lethal musical weapon, Gorbel will seclude himself backstage or back in the van and sing for upwards of 40 minutes, with tea, Red Bull, whiskey or any combination of the three.

While Gorbel tends to play an acoustic onstage, the show is undeniably heavy, featuring a backup band of Kamstra and two other musicians. Now touring with a full band instead of just Kamstra, the tour van is a whole new world.

Luckily, Gorbel packs light.

“I just need my iPod. And moist towlettes – gotta have moist towlettes.”