Album of the month :
March 2004
DARYLL-ANN (NL) :
" Don't stop " ( Excelsior)
Two years after their half-baked " Trailer Tales" - released under the band's name although it was actually more a solo effort by Jelle Paulusma - Daryll-Ann are back in stupendous form with this 6th studio album.
Since 1994 and their international debut-EP " I could never love you", the five from Amsterdam have always ploughed the same furrow, remaining true to a classic and timeless songwriting inherited from the great stylists of the 60's and the 70's. Don't expect them to break new grounds or to jump in the last bandwagon. But if you need masters in the fine art of building one gem of a pop song from ingredients as old and worn as choruses, verses and briges, look no further: they are your men ! Rarely had they succeeded in this task as on this new album, which comes very close to the band's masterpiece " Happy Traum" ( 1999). Both records are quite different though. " Happy Traum" had that folky side to it, making it a subdued, restrained, intimist album. " Don't stop" is packed with the same melodic richness and emotional weight, but with more muscle and punch. This time, it makes you move.
Don't get fooled by the opening-track. Swathed in a dramatic soundscape made of ghostly organ, reedy mandolin and string rustles, Freeway, a gloomy ballad in the Leonard Cohen vein, is not the most typical sample of this collection. It is actually the buoyant When War Is On which sets the tone to the album and gives it its real start. Fueled by slide-guitar licks, honky-tonk piano and tenderly ironic vocals by Paulusma, it adopts a jaunty pop bounce and rides it with the genuine authenticity of The Band circa " Music from Big Pink". We Love Danger displays a similar exhilarating effect, adding groovy synth hooks and gorgeous backing vocals to a compelling rhythmic push. These toe-taping numbers, often enhanced by a distinctive acid-rock treatment, constitute the album's mainstray, and provide some of its finest moments. The Movin' Men, for instance, rocks joyously through jubilant guitar riffs and no-frills harmonica blows. It is even better when Anne Soldaat's scintillating guitar solos join the game, as if they'd come straight from Haight-Ashbury '67. They illuminate the indelible hooks and luscious vocal harmonies of Fame, and set fire to that improbable meeting between Johnny Cash and Moby Grape on Wild Side Brother. At times, Daryl-Ann also temper that fleet, energetic approach with slower, more intimate pieces like Strange, a neat melody partly spoiled by a mellifluous synth backing, or the reach-for-the-sky beauty of You and Me Darlin', very much in the " Happy Traum" vein. But nothing comes as close to perfection as the penultimate track, Raga The Messenger. Over a crystal-clear canvas of Byrdsian guitars, it shows Daryll-Ann at their very best: dazzling melodies, brilliant arrangements ( check the sepentine organ on the chorus), heartfelt vocals, and even a bridge that sees Soldaat going " Du du du du du" while the rest of the band answers " Pa-pa, Pa-pa". Just wonderful !
It is a blatant injustice that, after all these years, Daryl-Ann are still not known and respected outside the fronteers of their homeland. This album gives further proof - if needed - that they deserve much, much better.
BAND:
LABEL:
http://www.excelsior-recordings.com