There are a couple of things you can expect from any Steve Dawson album: it’s going to be beautifully arranged and played, and definitely unpredictable. ‘Eyes Closed, Dreaming’ doesn’t disappoint on either count. It’s the third of Steve’s pandemic albums, with contributions pieced together remotely, a logical and necessary extension during lockdown of the studio practice of recording parts separately. It’s a tribute to Steve and all the superb musicians involved that the whole album feels like it was recorded by musicians playing in the same room. The arrangements on the album are trademark Steve Dawson with lots of layers of guitars and a whole raft of instruments that are unusual in any context but particularly in Americana arrangements. As ever, he makes it work, creating soundscapes that sound uncluttered while using multiple guitars, bass, drums, keyboards (including Moog and mellotron), strings, horns and even marxophone, vibraphone and pump organ.

Steve enjoys reworking other people’s songs with his own spin and there are four of those on the album, ‘Long Time to Get Old’ and ‘Guess Things Happen That Way’ get the swampy Southern rock treatment, while ‘Small Town Talk’ with its horns, nods in the direction of Muscle Shoals and ‘Let Him Go on Mama’ is a solo piece with Weissenborn backing that closes the album. There are also a couple of reworkings of traditional songs. These are all great versions that give Steve a chance to have a bit of fun and show his instrumental versatility, but the backbone of the album is the four songs co-written with Matt Patershuk.

Matt’s a hugely creative and poetic songwriter and the four co-writes are a good representation of the breadth of topics he likes to cover, from the nostalgic ‘Polaroid’, harking back to a pre-digital era to the wonders of nature expressed in ‘The Owl’. ‘Hemingway’ references, well, Ernest Hemingway, while ‘A Gift’ is about taking care of your family and showing pride in workmanship. Like all of Matt’s songs, they’re thought-provoking and occasionally spring a few surprises. As good as the rest of the album is, these four songs shine brightly.

Steve Dawson’s one of the many that accepted the pandemic lemons and made artisan lemonade by learning a completely new way of working and using the enforced break to create three superb albums. ‘Eyes Closed, Dreaming’ covers a range of styles from folk ballads through Americana to ragtime and Hawaiian music and Steve sounds convincing in all of them with his range of instruments, particularly the Weissenborn. And I almost forgot to mention that he has a great laid-back and soulful vocal style. You won’t get bored listening to this album.

‘’Eyes Closed, Dreaming’ is released on Black Hen Music (BHCD0098) on Friday March 24th.

Here’s a live studio video for ‘Small Town Talk’:

Two years after their debut ‘Just Beyond the Shine’, Peach & Quiet are back with another bunch of great songs aided and abetted by producer and guitarist extraordinaire Steve Dawson. The album continues where the debut left off with some gorgeous Americana/country rock/blues stylings with a few influences creeping in from the background of the duo Jonny Miller and Heather Reed. Our review of their debut referenced the usual Laurel Canyon influences but ‘Beautiful Thing’ pulls in some slightly rockier influences like seventies Fleetwood Mac (or particularly Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks) and a lot of that’s down to Steve Dawson’s production and playing with layers of guitars from resonators through electrics to pedal steel.

The gentle title track sets the tone for the album; its country feel with those guitar layers, lovely harmonies and Jonny Miller’s slightly raspy vocal are things that you hear in varying degrees throughout the album. As an added bonus (for me, anyway), the song opens with one of my favourite chord progressions, falling from the tonic to the subdominant. Want to know why I like this progression? It features in two of my favourite songs, ‘These Days’ by Jackson Browne and Graham Parker’s ’Watch the Moon Come Down’. And honestly, speaking as a mediocre guitarist, it’s easy to play and sounds good.

With a title ‘Horse and Saddle’ you’d be expecting a country arrangement; that would be too predictable. Jonny’s dad is a reggae DJ and he was brought up around reggae musicians, so the influence was always going to come out somewhere. Heather’s dad was a Hammond player and Hammond’s very much in evidence on the slow blues of ‘This Time’, the rock vibe of ‘Behind the Sun’ with a nod in the direction of Crazy Horse and ‘Pockets Empty’, the story of a relationship with a charismatic psychopath.

At a time when temperatures are heading below zero again, ‘Beautiful Thing’ brings a welcome splash of California sunshine with its infectious melodies, exquisite harmonies and perfect arrangements, balancing multiple guitar parts with piano and Hammond to create perfect settings for Jonny and Heather’s solo and duet vocals. Summer feels a long way away at the moment, but this album brings it a bit closer.

‘Beautiful Thing’ is released on Peach & Quiet Music (P&QCD002) on 20th January 2023.

Here’s a live video of ‘This Time’:

We’re still seeing and hearing albums created during the lockdown using remote technology; this one’s a bit different in that it’s the first of three albums recorded by Steve Dawson during the pandemic featuring songs that might otherwise never have been released. The ten songs on “Gone, Long Gone” reflect the eclectic nature of Steve Dawson’s work as a performer and producer. As a multi-instrumentalist and keen student of musical history, Steve brings a wide range of influences and musical knowledge to anything he does; his own album is no exception. Of the ten tracks, there are two contrasting instrumentals, showcasing Steve’s exceptional guitar skills, seven songs co-written with the brilliant Matt Patershuk, and one cover.

The cover is a song that everyone with any interest in music at all seems to love (apart from Rod Stewart, who apparently refused to sing on the Faces studio version of the song). Steve takes it at a very relaxed pace, building up to big harmonies in the chorus and showcase solos towards the end. It’s not quite as punchy as the original, but it’s an honest effort and a lovely homage. The two instrumentals demonstrate different facets of Steve’s work: his interest in Hawaiian music shines through “Kulaniapia Waltz”, creating an authentic feel with ukulele and steel guitar, plus the not-so-authentic pump organ while “Cicada Sanctuary” is a solo acoustic guitar piece inspired by hearing the noise of massed cicadas and being inspired to play something that fitted the mood. Both are very evocative mood pieces.

The remaining seven songs are the Matt Patershuk co-writes. Steve has always been wary of the collaboration process, but Matt’s a good friend and he’s a songwriter that knows how to write something that’s a bit different. The results are very impressive; “King Bennie had his Shit Together”, a fictionalised take on the life of Hawaiian steel guitarist King Bennie Nawahi, set against a backdrop of a jazzy bluegrass shuffle, tells an interesting story, cleverly pulling the listener into the first-person narrative of the tales of an old musician.

You can find historical musical references dotted throughout the album; the opener “Dimes” is a bit of fun that hints at Little Feat, “Bad Omen” and “6 Skeletons in a Car” (not as gruesome as it sounds) both have a brooding, menacing Southern groove feel while “I Just Get Lost” jumps into a chorus that strongly echoes The Beatles’ “Revolution”. You get the picture; there’s a lot of variety and you never quite know what’s round the next corner.

“Gone, Long Gone” is an album for people that want to actually listen to music, rather than passive consumers; the quality of the songwriting, playing and arrangement deserves much more than that. It’s out now on Black Hen Music (BHCD0096).

Here’s the official video for the album’s opener, “Dimes”:

Our first review of 2022 and we thought we should start with a bit of confusion. Of the two Steve Dawsons that we now seem to feature regularly (because they’re both very, very good at what they do). This is the Chicago Steve Dawson as opposed to the Nashville Steve Dawson; the one who released the excellent “At the Bottom of a Canyon, In the Branches of a Tree” in June 2021. Steve had enough finished songs for a double album but “Canyon” was released as a single album; this left an album’s worth of oven-ready songs that Steve now intends to release as singles and possibly an EP. He’s releasing “A World Without You” to coincide with his British mini-tour starting at the Americana Music Association UK showcase in Hackney on January 25th.

The song is an example of a classic understated arrangement. It’s a simple, slow triple-time ballad, with a traditional four-piece backing given an added soulful edge with a sprinkling of piano and organ (courtesy of Alton Smith) and some lovely descending guitar arpeggios. Steve’s notes on the song tell us that he was aiming for a Merle Haggard feel with the song, but there’s also more than a hint of sixties/seventies Southern soul in there as well, Stax ballads or James Carr, maybe. Lyrically, you can interpret “A World Without You” as a straightforward break-up song, but Steve feels it’s more influenced by the loss of his in-laws. Either way, it’s a beautiful soul/country ballad.

“A World Without You” is released the UK on Friday January 21 on PravdaRecords.

You can see Steve Dawson in the UK at these places and dates in January:

Tue 25               London Hackney Social, AMA UK showcase

Wed 26              Leicester* The Musician

Thu 27               Birmingham* Kitchen Garden Cafe

Sat 29                 Sheffield* The Greystones

Sun 30               Carshalton Cryer Arts Centre

*with The Fargo Railroad Co.

Bob Bradshaw’s a bit of a regular around these parts. We’ve reviewed four of his albums and this is his third contribution to our High Fives feature. His songs are exceptional and original and his albums are examples of sequencing a series of songs to create a coherent entity, particularly on his 2019 album “Queen of the West”.

Photo by Rafi Sofer

Podcasts were a life-saver for me over the past year and a half, especially music podcasts. Here’s my high five, with examples (sometimes drawn from previous years but I heard them for the first time in 2021).

Cocaine and Rhinestones.

Tyler Mahon Coe’s wildly opinionated, rip-roaring podcast about the history of Country music is a trip. His use of sometimes obscure song clips to illustrate points is masterly. He’s devoting the whole of the present season to George Jones. This episode from the first season about Buck Owens and Don Rich is terrific:

Music Makers and Soul Shakers.

Steve Dawson is a fine guitar player/producer himself and this is one of the best nuts-and-bolts podcasts for and about musicians I’ve heard. There’s some great stories in this episode with Marc Ribot:

https://www.makersandshakerspodcast.com/podcast/8-marc-ribot

My Favorite Album.

Host Jeremy Dylan has interviewed Daniel Lanois, Mitchell Froom, and Max Weinberg, among others. In this episode the great Nick Lowe explains how he puts a live show together:

https://myfavoritealbum.libsyn.com/338-nick-lowe-breaks-down-his-live-show

Love That Album.

Maurice Bursztynski’s wide-ranging, low-key approach is perfect for discovering new music, or revisiting old favorites. Steve Berlin, from Los Lobos, talking about their 2021 album ‘Native Sons’ is a good place to start:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/interview-with-steve-berlin-about-los-lobos-native-sons/id459559336?i=1000536614565

Dangerous Amusements: The Elvis Costello Playlist. Perhaps only Dylan or Bowie are worthy of this level of scrutiny (and there are podcasts about both that I don’t think much of.) Fellow musicians, journalists and music business folk discuss (with host Stu Arrowsmith) what Costello has meant to them over the years, and pick one song from each of the five decades Costello has been producing his idiosyncratic catalogue. There’s plenty good stuff in this interview with Glen Colson who did publicity and promotion for Costello in the early years:

https://podcasts.apple.com/il/podcast/glen-colson/id1535324499?i=1000527944399&l=iw

Photo by Matthew Gilson

Confusingly, there are two Steve Dawsons on the Americana scene, both very highly regarded and both featured on Music Riot at various times. This Steve Dawson is the one from Chicago and member of Dolly Varden and Funeral Bonsai Wedding whose powerful album “At the Bottom of a Canyon in the Branches of a Tree” was reviewed here earlier this year. Here are some of the things that made 2021 a good year for Steve.

For me personally 2021 was a peak year. A project I’d been working on for over 3 years was released as “At the Bottom of a Canyon in the Branches of a Tree,” and very well received. The contrast of my good fortune with so much loss and hardship in the world due to the pandemic was sobering and clarifying. I do think (hope) that the pandemic and the uncertainty it caused has made people more grateful for the things that matter, and that includes live music and connection. Here’s a few things that I am grateful for in 2021.

Waxahatchee singing Dolly Parton’s, “Light of A Clear Blue Morning” This came out in 2020 but I started listening to it in the spring of 2021 and it was the perfect song to slowly emerge from the nightmares of the Trump era and lockdown. I taught online guitar and songwriting classes during the lockdown and sang this version of this song with them all. It was healing. Katie Crutchfield’s voice on this track is otherworldly.

The long-delayed release concert for my album from 2020, “Last Flight Out,” at the Old Town School of Folk Music, Chicago
I recorded an album called “Last Flight Out” with my folk-jazz group, Funeral Bonsai Wedding, that featured the Quartet Parapluie String Quartet in 2019 and it was released in May, 2020, at the height of the pandemic. The release concert for the record had to be rescheduled four times. This past October we finally were able to do the show and for many it was the first live event they’d been to in over 18 months. I’ve never experienced a show that was that cathartic for the audience and musicians together and I don’t know that I will ever again.

Pravda Records

My new album, “At the Bottom of A Canyon In the Branches Of A Tree,” was released on a legendary Chicago indie label called Pravda Records. I couldn’t be happier to be a part of their roster of artists. Thank you Kenn, Melissa and Sheila!!

Bandcamp

Bandcamp really shines in the online music world. They really showed up for indie musicians by creating “Bandcamp Friday” on the first Friday of each month since the pandemic began – by waiving their share and having the artists and labels get all the income. In a world enamored by the greed of Spotify and Amazon, Bandcamp is a miracle.

Kath and Kim Diane and I were introduced to this super wacky Australian sitcom from the early 2000’s by a friend and now we can’t stop watching it and quoting lines back to each other. “Look at moy, look at moy, look at moy…”

You can’t deny that the last couple of years have been difficult times for musicians, but the creative impulse won’t be stifled. Artists will take the clay that’s available and use it to fashion their creations. The Trump years spawned many memorable albums, then musicians found different ways of working through a pandemic with very little personal interaction to help the process. Steve Dawson’s raw material for “At the Bottom of a Canyon in the Branches of a Tree” came from a different place. Following a family tragedy, he took an extended sabbatical to decide whether he wanted to continue writing and performing. A songwriting retreat with Richard Thompson and Patty Griffin gave him the answer he needed and he found his clay (mainly) in his own personal experiences.

The album’s quite unusual in that it’s almost entirely the work of Steve Dawson; there are no co-writes or covers and only three other musicians make cameo appearances. Apart from Alton Smith’s piano on a couple of songs, Michael Miles’ banjo on “The Spaces In Between” and a Diane Christiansen vocal on “We Are Walking in a Forest”, every hook, lick and vocal is Steve Dawson. Quite apart from the instrumental versatility, showcases Steve’s vocal range from the easy, languid tenor into high falsetto. Steve’s voice evokes the classic American west coast country rock bands, sounding at times like Don Henley or Randy Meisner and there’s the occasional nod in the direction of Jackson Browne as the album pulls off the trick of sounding vaguely familiar while constantly introducing new ideas and sounds.

The settings for the songs are pretty laid-back, with nods towards sixties/seventies soul in “This Is All There Is”, psychedelia in “Beautiful Mathematics”, Crazy Horse in the title track and Jackson Browne on “Hard Time Friend”, which has a breakdown and restart two-thirds of the way through that feels a lot like the last section of JB’s “The Late Show” (one of Springsteen’s favourite recorded moments). The musical settings are incredibly varied, with some interesting keyboard instruments appearing (mellotron and dulcimer for a start), creating the perfect ambience for each of the songs.

The album could easily have been a fairly depressing experience, with songs about COVID deaths and forced positivity (“This Is All There Is”), dysfunctional families (“She Knew”) and the limitations of the forgiving gesture (“Forgiveness is Nothing Like I thought it Would Be”), but Steve leavens the mixture with the resoundingly upbeat “22 Rubber Bands”, a song about his love for his daughter, and “Hard Time Friend”, dedicated to his friend Diane Christiansen, celebrating the friends who are with us through times that are good or bad, happy or sad. There are two bonus CD and download songs which didn’t make the vinyl cut for reasons that have nothing to do with quality; “You’re Trying Too Hard”, which nails fake authenticity, and “However Long it Takes”, a reminder that we can always choose to see the good things in the world rather than the negativity which so often surrounds us.

Twelve tracks, fourteen if you buy the CD or download, and each one with an interesting arrangement and lyrics conveying ideas that are important to Steve Dawson, as they should be to all of us. It’s ironic to think that this bunch of songs were created by someone who had started to doubt his creative abilities.

“At the Bottom of a Canyon in the Branches of a Tree” is released on Pravda Records (PR6419) on Friday July 16th.

Here’s the animated video for “22 Rubber Bands”:

It’s drizzling, freezing and absolutely miserable in the UK at the moment, so that would be the perfect time to listen to an album straight out of 1970s Laurel Canyon via 2020s British Columbia. There are more influences on the album than the Jackson Browne/Eagles/Linda Ronstadt coterie but the album still glows with sunshine of The Golden State, even though its creators Heather Read and Jonny Miller have fairly nebulous Californian connections but, hey, the first two Eagles albums were produced by Glyn Johns at Olympic Studios in London, while Peach & Quiet’s “Just Beyond the Shine” was put together with the help of producer and multi-instrumentalist Steve Dawson in Nashville, Toronto, Vancouver and Victoria. All of the songs are written by Heather, Jonny or both apart from the album’s closer, “Seven Daffodils”, written by Lee Hays and Fran Moseley.

The sun breaks through from the opening notes of the Byrds/Tom Petty-inflected opener, “Empty to Fill” and its poetic exploration of the contradictions and complexity of human beings. From there it’s almost constant Oakley and Ray-Ban stuff, with the exception of the slightly menacing Southern-influenced “Shoreline After A Storm” likening a bad relationship to a storm – they can both inflict terrible damage and leave a messy aftermath. There’s a little hint of “I Put A Spell on You” in there as well.

The songwriting is superb throughout, from the fairly straightforward love song “There’s A Very Good Chance” with its lovely Everlys harmonies to the more complex “Flowers”, which is based on the children’s book “Mr Cat and the Little Girl” which deals with love and loss which has a folky Byrds styling with a relatively complex arrangement that even features a bit of glockenspiel, courtesy of Steve Dawson.

There are themes running though the album; lyrically it’s all about love, whether it’s love for a partner who’s on stage every night (“Lucky in Love”) or for a place (“California Way”). The song arrangements are in the Eagles/Linda Ronstadt mode with layers of electric and acoustic guitars and some absolutely gorgeous harmonies, either as duets or as multi-tracked layers. There’s absolutely nothing out of place on this album.

And, as I finish this review, there’s no rain, and the sun is shining; that was pretty impressive work, guys. This album’s combination of superbly-crafted songs and subtle Laurel Canyon-era  arrangements is the perfect antidote to winter on either side of the Atlantic.

“Just Beyond the Shine” is released on January 15th 2012 on Peach & Quiet Music (P&QCD001).

Here’s the video for “Empty to Fill”:

 

The Kennet and Avon Canal might not be the Mississippi Delta but Devizes, one of the towns it passes through, is the home of Joe Edwards, and its café and bar scene gave Joe the chance to develop his intimate style and delivery. My notes for this album use the word intimate a lot; actually, I use it an awful lot, because it sounds like it was recorded in an empty basement bar. The actual recording was tracked live over a period of ten days with Canadian guitarist and producer Steve Dawson adding various slide instruments to the mix. The album’s mostly blues-based, although the uplifting title song is closer to uptempo country with a full band including organ and pedal steel.

The stripped-back and laid-back production and tasteful playing might not be to everyone’s taste, but there’s no doubt about the quality of the playing on “Keep On Running”,  and Joe’s vocals are strong and distinctive on both the slow and the uptempo songs. On a couple of songs on the album, particularly “Trouble”, Joe sounds a lot like Gerry Rafferty on the “City to City” album. If your thing is bluesy songs played with lots of feel and no grandstanding, then this album should be just right for you.

“Keep On Running” is released in the UK on Tiny Mountain Records (TMRCD101) on May 22nd.

This album is like a sea-breeze on a hot summer’s day; it’s cooling and soothing, and once it starts, you don’t want it to stop. Canadian Maya Rae isn’t eighteen yet and she’s already been singing professionally for six years. Six years! She recorded her first album of jazz covers at the age of thirteen, but this is an entirely different beast; it’s a batch of songs co-written with her brother Evan that display a remarkable maturity while still retaining a sense of wonder and innocence. They’re delivered by a set of highly-accomplished musicians, and the end of result is my favourite new album of the year so far. If your interest has been piqued by what you’ve read so far, check out some of the Spotify song links as well. If you want a few quick and easy reference points, try early Joni Mitchell, Norah Jones and maybe even (completely coincidentally) the first Corinne Bailey Rae album.

You would expect someone who’s been singing professionally since the age of twelve to have a good voice and you won’t be disappointed. Maya’s voice is rich and clear, and she has an impressive range as well. We all know that often that isn’t enough; you need the right team and usually you need a good throw of the dice at some point.

This album came about as a result of Maya sending a demo to Canadian uber-producer Steve Dawson, who managed to pull a bunch of musicians together in Nashville to record the album in just three days. The result sounds anything but rushed; it all fits into place perfectly and the arrangements create the perfect picture-frame for all of the delicately-crafted songs. And there are so many insidious hooks. Whether they’re the work of Steve Dawson or the musicians involved in the project, I don’t know, but each one pulls you in to the song, and they come from all directions, violin, guitar, organ, synthesiser; you name it.

I recommend that you give the entire album a listen, but if you twisted my arm, my favourites would be the incredibly catchy opener “Can You See Me”, which talks about the masks we wear to hide our true selves, the optimistic “The Sun Will Come Out Again” and the sinuously funky, Bill Withers-esque, groove of “New to Me”. I could go on, but I really want you to listen to the whole album and then buy it. This classy bunch of songs, beautifully interpreted, and sung with such clarity and precision, is something your collection needs.

“Can You See Me?” is out now on Black Hen Records (BHCD0092).