Artist: Dawes
Album: Stories Don't End
Bitrate: 229kbps avg
Quality: EAC Secure Mode / LAME 3.98.4 / -V0 / 44.100Khz
Label: Hub Records
Genre: Rock
Size: 87.76 megs
PlayTime: 0h 51min 08sec total
Rip Date: 2013-04-03
Store Date: 2013-04-09
Track List:
--------
01. Just Beneath The Surface 4:08
02. From A Window Seat 4:28
03. Just My Luck 4:06
04. Someone Will 3:33
05. Most People 4:31
06. Something In Common 5:11
07. Hey Lover 2:47
08. Bear Witness 4:17
09. Stories Don't End 5:00
10. From The Right Angle 4:10
11. Side Effects 5:42
12. Just Beneath The Surface 3:15
(Reprise)
Release Notes:
--------
There must be something in the water of Laurel Canyon. Forty years ago, this
winding L.A. aerie served as both a refuge and networking opportunity for Joni
Mitchell, Neil Young, Jackson Browne, Crosby, Stills and Nash and more.
In the last decade, the famed locale has incubated a whole new wave of
singer-songwriting sensitivos. The latest revolves around Jonathan Rice, Mike
Bloom and two striking bands: Rilo Kiley and Dawes.
Of all of them, Dawes best translates the tone and depth of the canyonÆs
original poets. ThatÆs largely down to its frontman and lead writer, Taylor
Goldsmith. He shares with Mitchell and Browne a flair for psychological insight,
a quest for philosophical perspective and an exquisite feel for language. HeÆs
one of his generationÆs finest writers.
Goldsmith also references his predecessors in his voice. It sags in the middle,
much like a dour young Browne. At times, his cadences and timbre sound so much
like Browne, he may want to go back and recheck his birth records.
References like those have to make Dawes itchy. No young band wants to be framed
entirely by the past. Small wonder on the folk-rock bandÆs third, and latest,
album, ôStories DonÆt End,ö they ditched L.A. to record in the Blue Ridge
Mountains of North Carolina.
Of course, they still end up sounding Californian. But Dawes never needed to
worry about coming off as pure revivalists to begin with. Their melodies have
too much individual beauty, and GoldsmithÆs lyrics express a point of view too
obviously his own.
He writes unusually long phrases, some marked by the rhetorical force and
clarity of prose. In the piece that opens and closes the disc, ôJust Beneath the
Surface,ö he takes up to nine lines to complete a thought. The result keeps the
listener rapt, waiting for Goldsmith to finalize his feelings. Like many of his
songs, psychological insights form their core of this one.
ôBeneath the Surfaceö addresses the quest to repress our past selves that color
present behavior. In ôSomething in Common,ö Goldsmith struggles to assemble
different aspects of his character into a coherent human being, while in the
title track, inspired by a Joan Didion essay, he deals with the wandering
narrative of life. Wittily, he treats it as a tale that overstays its welcome.
GoldsmithÆs melodies, and the bandÆs playing, have the plucky touch and melodic
rapture of Æ70s L.A. folk-rock. From the spry beat in ôFrom a Window Seatö to
the doleful tune in ôJust My Luck,ö thereÆs a sure sense of composition that
both recalls a classic era and speaks to any.