It’s been a strange, serendipitous last few days.
I was watching political argument show Question Time on the TV last Thursday, broadcast from the lovely surroundings of the De La Warr Pavillion in the English South Coast town of Bexhill-on-Sea. It was in this venue in December 2008 that I saw a brilliant Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan set (ably supported by The Miserable Rich), which put the tin hat on a great (once we found where the thermostat was – it was December and bloody freezing) few days spent with a couple of friends in an apartment that couldn’t be closer to the sea if it tried.
This of course set off a period of both reminiscing about time spent, as well as wishful thinking about revisiting if only a decent excuse presented itself. The decent excuse presented itself shortly afterwards, when a friend alerted me to the fact that Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore, creators and performers of one of my favourite albums of this year so far in Dear Companion, had announced UK dates in support of Billy Bragg. And further rummagings revealed that they indeed were to appear under the lovely art deco roof of the DLWP. This may well be the furthest I’ll be travelling to see a support act, and I can’t wait.
So, all this good fortune caused me to dig out Daniel Martin Moore’s 2008 debut Stray Age, one of my most-listened to albums of recent years.
Daniel Martin Moore was “discovered” in the time-honoured tradition of sending a 4-song demo into a record label (Sub Pop, enjoying a rich and ecelectic run of success at the moment) and seeing what would happen. No major shakes there, but in this age of the internet and networking and all that cobblers, it all seems a little quaint. Which is very fitting given that Stray Age sounds as if it has come from a few decades ago and has survived the journey incredibly well, picking up a few new ideas along the way.
The first – and, it has to be said, enduring – impression from the beginning of the opening title track, is Nick Drake. The thoughtfully-picked guitar and rich vocal style evoke Nick’s work, although there’s certainly enough of Daniel’s own style in there to prevent it from sounding derivative. And although the album remains vaguely folky at its core, there’s enough “something else”-ness at work to keep the listener quietly enthralled. Strangely, the most Drake-sounding track here is a cover of someone else’s work, Sandy Denny/Fairport Convention’s Who Knows Where the Time Goes could almost be Northern Sky in another lifetime, such is the delivery. There’s also a couple of more modern influences at work, with Every Colour and Kind sounding not unlike Jeff Klein’s I’m Sorry Sweet Emily, which is by no means a bad thing.
Having said that, this is a singular piece of work. As a debut, it’s incredibly warm and unassumingly powerful, and is delivered in such a way that from the second listen onwards, it’s like a very old friend. Maybe not something that would go down well at parties, or for the drive to/from work on a dreary day, but something to just pop on in the evening when you just want the musical equivalent of a comfy chair by the fire. Hopefully this debut will send Daniel well on the way to great success, as it’s a startlingly good first outing.
UK Tour Dates with Ben Sollee:
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