NYC singer-songwriter George Usher doesn’t let his small, independent label status prevent him from creating lush baroque pop symphonies. The underground pop troubadour, who served time with Beat Rodeo and the Schramms, writes deceptively simple pop tunes where the lyrics turn their meanings ever so subtly under thick beds of acoustic guitars and ancient keyboards. “Somewhere North of the Sky,” co-written with Bedsit Poets’ Ed Rogers, is a carefully enunciated piece of melancholy power pop. “The Stranger Came” continues this hopeful yet uneasy truce with love and fate. “Put It Out of Your Mind” is visited by a ghostly Hammond organ. “Unforgivable Sin” adds pedal-steel, while the beautifully sad “Just A Story” reminds one of the ‘60s Kinks and satisfies with piano and strings. “I Would Have Done Anything” sails past with breezy, forlorn harmonies and French Horn. Usher believes in pop music with strong roots in the 1960s (think Kinks, Left Banke) without settling for mere revisionism.