Patrick Crowson "Finito La Comedia" (Independent, 2009)
Crowson has something going on here that separates him from the pack
Dark American folk, a voice hidden deep in the shadows, and mostly just a guitar for accompaniment. There are flecks of, if you will, the tradition, moments when you're inches from an early Dylan recording, never more so than on Missouri, but more often you're a lot further back, way down a side road somewhere rural enough to still be far beyond electricity, where someone is singing inside a wooden shack with broken glass in the windows. More like a mood than an album, and the mood is distinctly bleak.
For all that, it's not a hard listen. You want to strain your failing ears to pick up whatever Crowson is mumbling at the moment. It seems like it might be important, or if not then at the least of interest. The songs flow like a stream of consciousness, although that's a blues tinged folk consciousness, and on their elliptical trajectories almost become clear amongst the clouds of obscurity.
Ragged bar drunks redeem themselves from judgement by buying drinks for all. Mexico becomes worthy of blessing for being so poor - if it wasn't the girl's grandfather wouldn't have pushed North. True Preachers offer something better than what's gone before without even the confidence of being sure they are right.
Handful of Rain opens with a mournful Neil Young mouth harp break, then promises that you can get by, not forever maybe but for quite a while, on alcohol. And if alcohol lets you down then maybe the angels will hold you up. Maybe best not to bank on it though.
It's a crowded market for singer-songwriters, but Patrick Crowson has something going on here that separates him from the pack. Musically sparse, an elemental voice dragged up out of a dirty ditch, and somehow mixed in with the bleak despair there really is hope even if it's not of better things. Midnight music, whatever time midnight is for you.
Date review added: Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Reviewer: Jonathan Aird
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Related web link: Patrick Crowson MySpace
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