Album Review: David Gray: Life in Slow Motion
Sometimes, it's really not fair.
Occasionally, an artist, or more often, just an album, hits you at this point when you're vulnerable--maybe you're in the midst of a titanic crush or break-up or important moment in your life, and some album you might generally sneer at or ignore suddenly becomes a vital part of your favorites, of your taste, of your collection. And even though you may have moved on completely from that moment of life, which has shrunk to insignificance or at least atrophied in its grasp on setting your musical tastes, that artist or album remains a part of your tastes forever--not really a guilty pleasure, but a sentimental pleasure, perhaps. I think this is generally known as nostalgia, but I like to think of it as the Babylon Syndrome.
David Gray is one artist whose epic string arrangements often make me blush, whose garishly earnest lyrics frequently make the cynic in me wince, but whose music makes my heart sing. I think it's my inner soccer mom coming out, which is ridiculously embarrassing (by all rights, I really shouldn't have an inner soccer mom), but inescapable.
Gray is basically a poor man's (or suburban housewife's) Damien Rice--both are lovelorn singer-songwriter with a charming accent that depict love with much ambiguity, all of which is lost behind the loveliness of the instrumentation and the characteristically bombastic vocal dynamics. The minute the lights go down, Damien and David are as money as Marvin Gaye (though for different age groups, I think).
Judged within the context of Gray's career, the album is fairly brilliant. There is a large Coldplay influence behind the driving piano accompaniments, but Gray's lyrics and themes are entirely vintage him. There are some great moments when a woman's gorgeous backing vocal comes in (almost certainly the influence of Damien Rice). Drums and synths are nearly gone, but the guitars are turned up, which actually works really well.
If you ever heard "Babylon," "This Year's Love," or the fantastic (but forgotten) "The Other Side" and were carried into raptures of imaginative and unrealistic love-bliss, you'll certainly like Life in Slow Motion. It's a triumph for David Gray, and a blessing for soccer-moms, romantics, and those whose hearts bleed when an Irishman intones the word "Love."
Occasionally, an artist, or more often, just an album, hits you at this point when you're vulnerable--maybe you're in the midst of a titanic crush or break-up or important moment in your life, and some album you might generally sneer at or ignore suddenly becomes a vital part of your favorites, of your taste, of your collection. And even though you may have moved on completely from that moment of life, which has shrunk to insignificance or at least atrophied in its grasp on setting your musical tastes, that artist or album remains a part of your tastes forever--not really a guilty pleasure, but a sentimental pleasure, perhaps. I think this is generally known as nostalgia, but I like to think of it as the Babylon Syndrome.
David Gray is one artist whose epic string arrangements often make me blush, whose garishly earnest lyrics frequently make the cynic in me wince, but whose music makes my heart sing. I think it's my inner soccer mom coming out, which is ridiculously embarrassing (by all rights, I really shouldn't have an inner soccer mom), but inescapable.
Gray is basically a poor man's (or suburban housewife's) Damien Rice--both are lovelorn singer-songwriter with a charming accent that depict love with much ambiguity, all of which is lost behind the loveliness of the instrumentation and the characteristically bombastic vocal dynamics. The minute the lights go down, Damien and David are as money as Marvin Gaye (though for different age groups, I think).
Judged within the context of Gray's career, the album is fairly brilliant. There is a large Coldplay influence behind the driving piano accompaniments, but Gray's lyrics and themes are entirely vintage him. There are some great moments when a woman's gorgeous backing vocal comes in (almost certainly the influence of Damien Rice). Drums and synths are nearly gone, but the guitars are turned up, which actually works really well.
If you ever heard "Babylon," "This Year's Love," or the fantastic (but forgotten) "The Other Side" and were carried into raptures of imaginative and unrealistic love-bliss, you'll certainly like Life in Slow Motion. It's a triumph for David Gray, and a blessing for soccer-moms, romantics, and those whose hearts bleed when an Irishman intones the word "Love."