Vincent Covello has an impressive pedigree outside of being a musical artist in his own right. As one of his promos states: “(Vincent Covello)’s client base…includes performers on Broadway in a variety of shows, such as; Les Miserables, The Lion King, Annie, Mary Poppins, A Little Night Music, Billy Elliot among many others. As well as a coach, Vincent is an award winning recording artist and songwriter with Billboard charted, TV and film placements, international TV and radio commercials, a member of ASCAP and Harry Fox Agency.
He has concert toured as a solo artists and toured as a vocal and performance coach for client based tours domestically and internationally. Vincent has an extensive training background and has studied with legendary vocal coach to the stars Seth Riggs, and two time grammy winning vocal/choral teacher Mary Alice Stollack. He is an alumni of Berklee College Of Music, Northwestern University and Interlochen Arts Academy.”
It’s only natural with that kind of resume he would release a musical effort like Torchlights, an adult pop album boasting hit tracks such as Time Plays Us All, Torchlight, Cry’n Eyes, Remember When, The Next Life and Here Then Gone. Each of the tracks feels individualistic, like a separate narrative. They also feel personal, raw, and unhinged, as Covello himself states through one of his representations the album’s origins come from an intensely personal place. “After losing his parents and brother in 2020, he created (Torchlights) in their honor,” the statement reads. “With Universal Music Group producer/artist Don Miggs, the Jim Riley band, orchestrator Andrew Joslyn, saxophonist Michael Lington, and writer Victor Migenes, an epic force was created with Vincent’s original standards, taking you on a journey of life, love, and loss in an emotional triumph of music through his voice and songs.”
Truer words couldn’t be said. There really is this kind of raw soulfulness to each of the tracks, along with a quiet sense of passion. This matters to Covello beyond just artistic ambition. The writing in each of the songs really gets to you, bringing with it this unexpected sense of delicacy. Take, for instance, the way he and his team markets each of the tracks as singles. For example, with Cry’n Eyes: “Bittersweet endings filled with grief, love, and loss. Not knowing how much you love someone, until you lose them.” Or, for instance, Time Plays Us All: “We often don’t realize what we want is right in front of us until it’s too late.
True love never dies within our hearts.” What could be cheap sloganing is actual, apt description of what each of the tracks conjure. I appreciated the genuine sense of heart in each of them too, the willingness of Covello to make you risk feeling he’s overly sentimental. Because of the authenticity, this never appears or comes across as the case. On one of the album jackets, a particular passage hits especially hard: “For the ancestors who strove with courage for a better life through journeys, sacrifice, hard work, relationships and the love of family, we carry your torchlights within our hearts and souls forever.”
Rachel Townsend