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Music reviews |
Damien Jurado - Where Shall You Take Me?
A gifted singer-songwriter slows things down with a half-hour of somber prairie storytelling.
Secretly Canadian
Release date: 3/4/03
Rating: B-1. Amateur Night 3:12
2. Omaha 3:18
3. Abilene 2:26
4. Texas to Ohio 2:56
- (mp3 from Secretly Canadian)
5. Window 2:21
6. I Can't Get Over You 3:11
7. Intoxicated Hands 4:35
8. Tether 2:34
9. Matinee 2:58
10. Bad Dreams 4:06Five years ago, Damien Jurado got a lot of notice with Rehearsals for Departure, a stunning album of stark, slow, spare folk. In 2002, he shifted gears, plugging in his guitar and rocking harder on I Break Chairs. With 2003’s Where Shall You Take Me, the pendulum swings back and the amplifiers stand unused.
The album’s 31-plus minutes take you to somewhat familiar territory, wallowing in that same Dust-Bowl lonesome Americana storytelling mood that dominates great records like Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska, Lucinda Williams’ Essence, Neil Young’s After the Gold Rush, or some of the slower songs Daniel Lanois produced for U2 and Robbie Robertson in the 1980s (think of U2’s “Running to Stand Still” or Robertson’s “Broken Arrow”).
Jurado wallows in this mood very well. Somber but not necessarily dark, this is music for drinking alone late at night, driving alone late at night, doing almost anything alone late at night. (Unless you’re a character in a Raymond Carver story, in which case this is music for pretty much any time of day.)
Jurado’s mostly acoustic, husky-voiced songs tell tales whose protagonists are mostly rural folk with nothing to lose, from the psycho killer narrating the opener, “Amateur Night,” to the single dad out driving with his kids in Nebraska at night in “Omaha,” to the penniless suitor of “Abilene,” to the small-town moviegoers in “Matinee.” The production is flawlessly clear, as on Jurado’s other albums; there are no raw or low-fi moments here.
“Amateur Night,” rather than a fully realized song, is more of a tone-setter for the rest of the album. The tone being sought, perhaps too overtly, is “haunting.” Jurado’s softly strummed guitar and soft-yet-loud lyric, all disturbing verse and no chorus, are joined by an ominous, gradually louder synth part, then it all tuckers out rather abruptly.
The Joe Henry-ish “Omaha,” which follows, is one of the album’s best songs. Slow but with electric guitar, a drum part, and pretty harmonies from Rosie Thomas, the song has a gorgeous chorus that sticks in your head. “Abilene” is perhaps even better, adding piano and shuffling percussion. (Jurado didn’t actually follow a song named after a town in Nebraska with a song named after a town in Kansas; Abilene is the name of the “black-haired girl” the singer is pursuing.) Both songs employ hummed harmonies to great effect.
Jumping in with a fuzzy guitar riff, “Texas to Ohio” blows away the morose mood of the first three songs, returning – for the only time on the album – to the raucous rock of I Break Chairs. (“Texas to Ohio” sounds vaguely like “Paper Wings,” a standout track on Jurado’s 2002 album.) Crashing drums, a yowled lyric, and a fitting keyboard part make this a great single for some parallel universe where artists like Jurado can actually get their music played on the radio or MTV. “Texas to Ohio” fades in a haze of feedback, and the acoustic-folk-harmonies return with “Window,” a pretty duet with Thomas, who sounds a lot like Emmylou Harris here.
Then the album hits a rough patch. The forlorn “I Can’t Get Over You” is pretty, with a nice falsetto break, but ultimately forgettable, thanks largely to a generic cry-in-your-beer country lyric. “Intoxicated Hands” is slow and ambitious, with a lyric about falling in and out of love while drunk on whiskey, but by my reckoning it’s the least successful song on the album. Jurado’s slurred lyrics (is he trying to sound drunk?) are annoying, while the clanging guitar, pounding bass and churning rhythm add up to an unpleasant dirge. “Tether” isn’t a bad song; it’s got that same guitar, drum and keyboard that work well on “Omaha” and “Abilene.” It’s just not as compelling as those earlier tracks.
“Matinee” ends the rough patch nicely. With hand claps and percussion, Jurado sings the praises of going to the movies in some mythical place where the soda is free, the ushers are helpful, and your best friend’s girl runs the ticket booth and can get you in when the boss is away. “Why go late when the movies are cheaper during the day?” Jurado asks. While “Matinee” lacks the raw emotion of most of the album’s other tracks, that might not be a bad thing – it’s a classic.
The closing song, the molasses-slow “Bad Dreams,” brings back the lonesome-prairie mood, adding some piano chords and a violin or two. “Come save me from this fire,” Jurado sings as the album fades to a close.
Where Shall You Take Me isn’t another Nebraska or After the Gold Rush – its weaker songs drag down about a third of the album, and it doesn’t sound as new as those records did. But Where Shall is certainly stronger than later Springsteen and Young efforts like The Ghost of Tom Joad and Harvest Moon. It establishes (or perhaps confirms) Damien Jurado’s status as one of the best singer-songwriters recording right now.
I look forward to hearing what he comes up with next, particularly whether he stays somber and subdued or whether he returns to the full-on rock of I Break Chairs. Though I enjoy Where Shall You Take Me, I won’t mind at all if Jurado’s pendulum swings back and he plugs his guitar back in next time.
