Songs You May Have Missed #756

10 Nov 2024 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in Songs You May Have Missed Tags: ,

Dawes: “The Game” (2024)

Dawes is the kind of band that, over the course of an album, can proverbially lull you to sleep with long, ponderous lyric phrases and melodies tending to be short on dynamics and originality.

Then like Ali in the Rumble in the Jungle they can wake you up with a quick jab of something so feel-osophical you’re not sure what hit you.

“The Game” is specific to itself as a story song, but in its summarizing title line it takes on metaphorical import.

Singer-songwriter Taylor Goldsmith and his brother, drummer Griffin Goldsmith have released the ninth Dawes album as a duo. Gone are a few bandmates. Still intact is their ability to create songs that show you your life through a new lens.

“The Game”

Millie came up playing in the boys’ clubs
But they made her play at midnight or at 8
Her friends all said the times were finally changing
It only felt a few centuries too late
Her eyes were always deep inside her notebook
Her hands were always tuning her guitar
And while some stayed busy waiting for permission
She was on her way to be a star

But if you asked her if anyone had held her back
She’d tеll you she forgot most of their names
Thе losers only think about the winners
The winners only think about the game

Then Millie fell in love with a civilian
Or at least we know he fell in love with her
He could see how bright her light was shining
He could feel how wild her fire burned
But love has its own kind of symmetries
You have to give as much as you receive
And once he realized he would never give her nothing
He decided it was time for him to leave

But now he likes to criticize her privately
While she simply says that neither were to blame
The losers only think about the winners
The winners only think about the game

So Millie kept on adding to the setlist
And working on her studio tan
And for the first time found it hard telling the difference
Between all her friends and all her fans
Which left her with a special brand of emptiness
She channeled right back into the songs
She wasn’t gonna ask herself the question
If this is what she wanted all along

Some people said she was a genius
Some people said she was insane
But those losers only think about the winners
The winners only think about the game

She wouldn’t suffer any fools
She danced to her own rhythm
She wasn’t playing by the rules
She was playing with ’em

Millie knew just when the dust was settled
When it’s time to put the pencil down
When the harmony is only just a shadow
Of the way it felt the first hundred times around
Which left her to the critics and the experts
To tell the world how Millie really felt
To somehow say she lost a competition
She was only ever having with herself

Well, some might look for meaning in the ashes
She just misses standing in the flame
The losers only think about the winners
The winners only think about the game
Oh, the losers only think about the winners
The winners only think about the game

Songs You May Have Missed #653

13 Feb 2020 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in Songs You May Have Missed Tags: ,

Dawes: “Hey Lover” (2013)

It doesn’t get much simpler than the sentiment (or the chorus) here:

Blue and white racing stripe pick-up truck
And when did I decide to grow this beard and gut?
Well, I may be white but I don’t like my people much
But I want to raise with you and watch our younglings hatch,
Fucking make the first letters of their first names match

Hey lover, hey lover
Hey lover, hey lover

See also: https://edcyphers.com/2012/02/21/recommended-albums-7/

Video of the Week: Dawes–All Your Favorite Bands

02 Jun 2015 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in Video of the Week Tags: ,

Recommended Albums #7

21 Feb 2012 2 Comments

by Ed Cyphers in Recommended Albums Tags: ,

North Hills (Dig)

Dawes: North Hills (2009)

In keeping with the trend of extolling mostly albums with either black or beige-ish covers, I present Los Angeles band Dawes’ 2009 debut, North Hills.

When I think of the various types of musical talent, the visual in my head is a triangle–but let’s call it a pyramid, ’cause nobody talks about the Food Triangle or the Inverted Triangle Of Global Liquidity. Pyramids are clearly cooler than simple triangles.

At the base of my Pyramid Of Musical Talent are competent vocalists. As the glut of singing-competition TV shows suggests, there are a lot of people out there who’ve been blessed with the ability to carry a tune (although I think these shows are the death bell for subtlety and nuanced song interpretation, but that’s another rant).

Above good singers in the pyramid are proficient instrumentalists. Seems like every third kid you meet can plug in and shred to one degree or another (although he has a sister and a girlfriend who can sing).

Above the people who can play, in the more rarified third tier of the triangle pyramid, are those who can compose an original, hummable melody. The writers of credible pop tunes are less common than the musicians who can play them, and much less so than those who can sing them. That’s why in, say, the 60′s there were far fewer Burt Bacharachs than Dionne Warwicks–as great a singer as she was, she was luckier to get to sing his songs than he was to have her sing them. Burt wrote timeless pop standards sung by Dusty Springfield, Jackie DeShannon, B.J. Thomas and many others. Warwick arguably never sang a classic song unless Bacharach (and David) wrote it. Without the melody the singer is irrelevant.

And because I believe gifted lyricists are an even rarer phenomenon than good composers, the topmost penthouse of my Pyramid Of Musical Talent is reserved for people who can write words like these:

So I am taking off my wristwatch/To let the time move how I please/To let my day be guided by the sunlight/Through morning’s bell and twilight’s soft release//So if you want to get to know me/Follow my smile down into its curves/All these lines are born in sorrows and pleasures/And every man ends up with the face that he deserves

…and…

So find me when you welcome back your roots/And I will be where all of your ends meet/I want the feeling waking next to you/I want to find my children at your feet

…and…

I will move somewhere the ocean’s never seen/Somewhere weeds just make their claims/Where my best friends exist only on screen/Where my love all fits in frames

Comparatively speaking, a new artist or band will frequently catch my attention with a distinctive sound or sticky melody. But seldom do lyrics penetrate to the forefront as they do here. And Dawes seem to construct their songs with this in mind–the arrangements are clean and restrained, with every instrument and voice put in service of the song. This is not a band interested in showing off by stepping out for the flashy solo or the over-the-top vocal performance. Think of Creedence Clearwater Revival who, with the rare exception, eschewed lead solos in favor of forming a good, solid pocket for the lyric. Jackson Browne will come to mind, too. Dawes seems to have borrowed his lyric-focused style and vocal sound, while happily avoiding the melodrama quotient that can make large doses of Browne’s stuff a bit tedious.

The band has a knack for an appealing turn of melody too. The album was recorded “live to tape” to achieve an organic, relaxed California Rock sound that should appeal to fans of the Eagles or Neil Young’s gentler tunes. Above all, I’d call it authentic. In a world of ear-candy, Dawes is making ear-nutrition that goes down real easy.

See also: https://edcyphers.com/2020/02/13/songs-you-may-have-missed-653/

Listen to: “When You Call My Name”

 

Listen to: “My Girl To Me”

 

Listen to: “If You Let Me Be Your Anchor”