Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Brian Pounds, a Season 5 contestant on The Voice, has launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a new album.

And the Season 5 contestant from The Voice isn’t exactly promising a toe-tapping, fun-loving pop album.

“I write mostly sad songs,” he admits in his Kickstarter pitch. “It’s not that I am sad, but I find power and meaning in desperate times. Plus, I’m not very good at writing happy songs.

“If I had a dream for this record — it would not be that this is the record you listen to every day. That you can hum along to without thinking on your way to work.

“I want this to be the record you look for when you need to. When you’re sad. When you’re lonely. There’s a ton of wonderful happy music to tap your toes to. But somebody has to make music for the days when you don’t want to get out of bed. I want to make that record.”

Brian, from Austin, Texas, has the track record to back up his claim — a five-track EP from 2014, a live album from earlier the same year and a self-titled EP from 2012 that includes a tune called “Romeo and Juliet,” one of my all-time favorite pre-Voice songs.

His Kickstarter campaign ends March 20 and, as of Friday, he was about $2,000 shy of that goal. Of course, there are all sorts of rewards for contributors. And if you check out his Kickstarter page, you can hear one of the songs he plans to include on the new record.

As for The Voice, Brian was 24 when he auditioned with Darius Rucker’s “Wagon Wheels” and landed a spot on Team Blake Shelton. He was eliminated in a battle round match against eventual finalist Austin Jenckes.

Below is “Romeo and Juliet” and “Jesus, Don’t Let Me Die (on My Feet).” The latter is from Brian’s 2014 EP.