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| Track List: 1. Former Glory 2. These Days 3. Least That I Can Do 4. God Loves Everyone 5. Disappearing Act 6. For a Moment 7. Gold in Them Hills 8. Heart's Desire 9. Dragonfly on Bay Street 10. The Less I Know 11. Up the Road 12. Best Friends 13. Gold in Them Hills (remix) Running time: 44 minutes Released: 2002 |
If nothing else, Ron Sexsmith conjured an evocative title for this record. Picked up after I got into Sexsmith through Blue Boy, I think there are some gems to be uncovered here despite my moving away from his music in the years since.
Former Glory is a gentle start, rough voice over a simple melody, themed of hope despite some challenges, nostalgia winning out and being a good thing. Bright and breezy in length as well as sound it is a smart little opening. I am sat here tired as a dog, all night indigestion meaning no sleep, so the gentle opener is a welcome thing.
These Days has a bit of strut to the rhythm, but I find I cannot but think of the Danny and the Champions of the World song of the same name instead. This tune is somewhat dull in comparison, but again rather gently so. The snap in the drums is nice, and the tune just about sustains itself as the song meanders on its lazy way. Ron Sexsmith is an odd duck - a prolific songwriter whose tunes have been sung by much bigger names to greater acclaim. A soft soul with a clear talent but not always with the performing chops to pull things off. For me, now, his songs here fall into the "nice" category - they're pleasant enough, but not excitingly so. Not offering anything much to get my teeth into, not offering any standout moments, structures or lines that grab attention.
His voice is not the most accomplished. Whilst I have a lot of time for unconventional voices, Sexsmith's voice on God Loves Everyone is more a question of a conventional voice that can't quite pull off what he is trying to do. It cracks a little, where a purer voice would carry the tune through. It is a shame because without those small cracks around the edges there might actually be that x-factor to some of these songs. That said, there are times when that slight broken edge actually makes his tunes. More on that later.
He returns to a more low-fi sound and twangy guitar for Disappearing Act - a more grubby sort of tune, and this suits him a bit better in my book. This tune is catchy, guitars, background keys and a rough vocal that suits the imperfect sound of the song as a whole. I rather like this one, it has a rawness to it that lends it authenticity, and connectivity. After a rather forgettable filler we hit the high point of the album - at least from memory - and this is one of those moments where the cracks in Sexsmith's voice lend gravitas to his work.
Gold in Them Hills is a wonderful, wonderful tune. Simple piano melody and his soft, stretching voice conveying a real sense of sorrowful hope - the message that, yes, things are bad now, but they'll get better. It is a really accomplished number, strings coming in to add weight to the tone, voice straining on the higher notes - conveying the importance of the message, the personal nature of it. I heard this song first in times that were less good, mental well-being wise, and I found strength in it them. Now I just find it a lovely little number.
Whilst trying to avoid a track-by-track I find myself reading a couple of other websites and getting annoyed with the way so many people on the net seem to write one-sentence paragraphs. It looks lazy and child-like to me. The odd short para to visually break up a wall of text is a good thing but every sentence being its own thing looks tacky (take note BBC online - a chief offender here). Of course, I look back up the page here and see a set of very similar length blocks and I don't think that works any better; what is that saying about stones and glasshouses? On the Record, a perfectly OK song has changed character with a long guitar-led outro, then given way to the disco-styled Dragonfly on Bay Street. This has a difference to it that makes it quite refreshing. It's not really a disco tune, but the rhythm and bass have an electronic fuzz to them that put this musically outside the general pattern of the album. I find myself rather liking it - it's massively watered down as compared to actual practitioners of these types of tunes but that helps make it his, y'know? That, and when it ends we are immediately back into soft ballad and acoustic guitar territory.
This listen feels like it has gone on forever, but this is really quite a short album. Normally that would signify not enjoying it, but... I am?
Putting a short line in there feels rather artificial given the previous stanza but that thought was a genuine one that hit me and I felt needed to be communicated as it is very much in the spirit of this project. Just two short numbers to go, then a remix of Gold in Them Hills to finish. The first of that trio of tunes is pitched lower and fits his voice rather well as a result, but when the vocal disappears what is left is pretty forgettable - a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde number then. This is followed by a sub 2-minute ramble with nothing much worth mentioning. The closing remix adds a tinny quality and unneeded electronic beats to a tune that was pretty much perfect as it was. There is, perhaps, also a nice tonal effect added to some of the keyboard notes, but the cost of adding this nice touch is too high.
The album goes out with a bit of a whimper really. I should perhaps cut a number of the weaker tracks here, but for some un-communicable reason I don't really feel like doing so.
Former Glory is a gentle start, rough voice over a simple melody, themed of hope despite some challenges, nostalgia winning out and being a good thing. Bright and breezy in length as well as sound it is a smart little opening. I am sat here tired as a dog, all night indigestion meaning no sleep, so the gentle opener is a welcome thing.
These Days has a bit of strut to the rhythm, but I find I cannot but think of the Danny and the Champions of the World song of the same name instead. This tune is somewhat dull in comparison, but again rather gently so. The snap in the drums is nice, and the tune just about sustains itself as the song meanders on its lazy way. Ron Sexsmith is an odd duck - a prolific songwriter whose tunes have been sung by much bigger names to greater acclaim. A soft soul with a clear talent but not always with the performing chops to pull things off. For me, now, his songs here fall into the "nice" category - they're pleasant enough, but not excitingly so. Not offering anything much to get my teeth into, not offering any standout moments, structures or lines that grab attention.
His voice is not the most accomplished. Whilst I have a lot of time for unconventional voices, Sexsmith's voice on God Loves Everyone is more a question of a conventional voice that can't quite pull off what he is trying to do. It cracks a little, where a purer voice would carry the tune through. It is a shame because without those small cracks around the edges there might actually be that x-factor to some of these songs. That said, there are times when that slight broken edge actually makes his tunes. More on that later.
He returns to a more low-fi sound and twangy guitar for Disappearing Act - a more grubby sort of tune, and this suits him a bit better in my book. This tune is catchy, guitars, background keys and a rough vocal that suits the imperfect sound of the song as a whole. I rather like this one, it has a rawness to it that lends it authenticity, and connectivity. After a rather forgettable filler we hit the high point of the album - at least from memory - and this is one of those moments where the cracks in Sexsmith's voice lend gravitas to his work.
Gold in Them Hills is a wonderful, wonderful tune. Simple piano melody and his soft, stretching voice conveying a real sense of sorrowful hope - the message that, yes, things are bad now, but they'll get better. It is a really accomplished number, strings coming in to add weight to the tone, voice straining on the higher notes - conveying the importance of the message, the personal nature of it. I heard this song first in times that were less good, mental well-being wise, and I found strength in it them. Now I just find it a lovely little number.
Whilst trying to avoid a track-by-track I find myself reading a couple of other websites and getting annoyed with the way so many people on the net seem to write one-sentence paragraphs. It looks lazy and child-like to me. The odd short para to visually break up a wall of text is a good thing but every sentence being its own thing looks tacky (take note BBC online - a chief offender here). Of course, I look back up the page here and see a set of very similar length blocks and I don't think that works any better; what is that saying about stones and glasshouses? On the Record, a perfectly OK song has changed character with a long guitar-led outro, then given way to the disco-styled Dragonfly on Bay Street. This has a difference to it that makes it quite refreshing. It's not really a disco tune, but the rhythm and bass have an electronic fuzz to them that put this musically outside the general pattern of the album. I find myself rather liking it - it's massively watered down as compared to actual practitioners of these types of tunes but that helps make it his, y'know? That, and when it ends we are immediately back into soft ballad and acoustic guitar territory.
This listen feels like it has gone on forever, but this is really quite a short album. Normally that would signify not enjoying it, but... I am?
Putting a short line in there feels rather artificial given the previous stanza but that thought was a genuine one that hit me and I felt needed to be communicated as it is very much in the spirit of this project. Just two short numbers to go, then a remix of Gold in Them Hills to finish. The first of that trio of tunes is pitched lower and fits his voice rather well as a result, but when the vocal disappears what is left is pretty forgettable - a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde number then. This is followed by a sub 2-minute ramble with nothing much worth mentioning. The closing remix adds a tinny quality and unneeded electronic beats to a tune that was pretty much perfect as it was. There is, perhaps, also a nice tonal effect added to some of the keyboard notes, but the cost of adding this nice touch is too high.
The album goes out with a bit of a whimper really. I should perhaps cut a number of the weaker tracks here, but for some un-communicable reason I don't really feel like doing so.
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