And I’m happy to report that it’s a damn fine CD that he has made. He titled it Mourning Songs, but when his graphic designer typoed it Morning Songs, he took the serendipitous hint and went with it. For all of Davis’ insistence that this CD is lighter, more affirmative and hopeful than his past work, the songs sure do contain their share of despair and darkness. Starting with Track One, “A Softer Place to Land,” the characters in Morning Songs, almost to a man, have lost firm footing. Certainties have all given way to raw midlife vulnerability. Personal crises are synchronized with social crises in a rich “Which way now?” tapestry of confusion. The affirmations come in small acts of heart, community, burden-sharing, reconciliation and forgiveness. Sounds like life. Sounds like New Paltz!
This was a long-brew, aged CD, done over the course of a couple of years, Davis working alone and in close collaboration with New Paltz bassist and recording engineer Jason Sarubbi (the Sweet Clementines, the Trapps, Tracy Bonham). The basic template is spare: acoustic guitar, light percussion, a few airy synths and some brass here and there for atmospheric support. Only a handful of songs sport full drum kits. More often, the grooves are powered by a single, wooly, thudding tom-tom and various shakes and jangles on the treble side.
But it would be terribly wrong to represent the album as Minimalist or muted. The songs build with remarkable restraint and patience, but they do build and blossom into broad flourishes, usually featuring gang vocals that approach a drunken gospel grandeur.
In a way that enhances its local flavor, Morning Songs is often subtly reminiscent of the solo work of our neighborhood rock hero Rhett Miller of the Old 97s, both in the expansively emotional, metaphor-laced lyrics and in the folk-plus harmony, where standard-issue roots chord changes are ever likely to take a turn toward the Beatlesque.
Well-wrought, emotive songs are the norm here, but a few stand out for me: the, light, campy pop elements of “Kim” offsetting the song’s grave subject matter, “Coming Home (Shot of Sunshine)” with its evocations of “Dear Prudence,” followed by the Stonesy, dissolute country waltz “Flannel and Blue (Laura’s Song).” A lovely mid-tempo stomper, “Long Long Way,” is a touching expression of community values.
“Whole Life Crisis” may sum it up best. For some people, especially creative types, the midlife crisis with its identity rehab is just a way of being, all the time and at every age. While creativity rewards and self-replenishes and everyone should try it, it is also a form of selfishness and withdrawal from worldly obligation. You almost get the feeling (or at least I do) that these sweet, deep songs are offered as apology and reparation for the damages done in making them.
His album is done and paid for, but its future is inherently uncertain, and Davis has opted to use Kickstarter to finance his promotional and radio campaigns to give this work a fighting chance in the market. Via Kickstarter (and Amazon.com, which provides the e-commerce infrastructure), artists appeal directly to their fans and listeners for contributions small and large, bypassing the thing that we used to call the music business. For more information on Seth Davis’ Kickstarter campaign and for some sneak peaks at Morning Songs, please go to www.kickstarter.com/projects/1147621777/help-market-and-promote-seth-davis-latest-release.
