|
By: Chris Pacifico
The production duo of Rich Machin and Ian Glover are probably better known in their native UK for their remixes of bands like Starsailor and Doves. While their debut release, Tough Guys Don't Dance (2003), didn't make so much as a peep on this side of the pond, they are now joined by Screaming Trees' singer Mark Lanegan for one of 2007's most earnest and heartfelt journeys into the purviews of dark, downtempo ambient music and gospel yearning.
While heavily influenced by Southern spirituals and Lanegan's all-around lurching style of music – a natural fit for his craggy voice - one doesn't have to be a religious person to get into Soulsavers. It's Not How far You Fall, It's the Way You Land's musical themes touch on the pain and sadness that lies within every human that comes out from time to time, while subliminally conveying that no one person is beyond redemption.
"Ghosts of You and Me" creaks and cracks with the piercing sonar of a howling wind while "Paper Money" has a coiling Hammond swirling around some sonic humming while Lanegan slowly croons, "Who's your daddy/ Can he love like me." The female gospel accents are nothing less than hair-raising. A couple of cover tunes fit nicely in the sequencing. The first is Neil Young's "Through My Sails" given a post-rock, daybreak feel and featuring none other than Bonnie "Prince" Billy. The second is the Rolling Stones' "No Expectations," and as far as Stones covers go, there's only two of them as powerful, if not more so, than the originals, namely Irma Thomas' take on "Time Is On My Side" and Townes Van Zandt's version of "Dead Flowers." The Soulsavers version of "No Expectations" makes it three. From 1968's Beggars Banquet, this slow, sad acoustic Delta style blues is made even it more despondent and beautiful with a slow organ glissade and the gentle brush of cymbals. Listeners are hereby dared to listen to it without shedding a tear.
JamBase | Where The Streets Have No Name
Go See Live Music!
|
