Jon Dee Graham is as solid as moonrock no dust on him. He's hurtled like a comet through the Austin music scene with the True Believers, backed great individual artists - Kelly Willis, John Doe, Michelle Shocked and still found time as he mellowed slightly to bring out three solo discs. Last of these Summerland was marked by some great songs played with a softer touch. Had the hard rock heart gone out of him. Was a life buried in Texas middle age dust beckoning. Well despite the mellow father image and his middle-age the good news is he ain't. First track, produced in LA as opposed to Austin, is a firecracker. So the comet returns. Maybe not quite burning with the True Believers intensity but with some solid songs in his wake. The tracks have great titles The Restraining Order Song for instance or The Huisache Tree. There's a knocked off quality and modesty to them that belies the honest craftsmanship at work. At first the rockier production and sheen was off-putting but repeated listening revealed a wealth of subtlety as in the finger-picked intro to I Go Too that wouldn't disgrace a Dave Alvin album.
There's also an acknowledgment of his Mexican influences on Volver that includes Tejano artist Little Joe. No fake roots show this it is a part of the man.
There are obvious influences. Listen to his rendition of the Waits gem Way Down In The Hole and it's obvious he permeates a lot of Graham's approach beyond the gravel bottom voice. Laredo (small dark something) could have come from one of Waits's nightmares. All in all a pretty solid set of songs and another step up for the kid from Quemado,Texas where a bright moon on a dark desert night was a welcome sight. Hooray for the moon indeed chico.

BUCKETFULL #61

Third album and the Spanish combo known as Migala spread their collective angel wings. Perhaps it is the increasing recognition overseas ( Subpop singles end of 2000) or the increasing sophistication of the avant-indie end of things in general as in Godspeed, Oldham, Calexico etc that has brought this gumbo to the boil. Second instrumental track 'El caballo del malo' outshines the Tuscon twosome with the swirling radio-dial electronica meshing with the sons of Morricone soundtrack. Then with a savage edit it sounds like we're in a late night Spanish bar or a desert trailer watching tv, mumbled voices, fingerpicked guitar. Piano surfaces and a voice so deep and sad it makes Tindersticks look positively jaunty. 'we thought the wind was howling for us' -millennium despair? Not a party record that's for sure. The black notes of previous efforts 'Diciembre 3 a.m.' and 'Asi duele un verano' are here made to look grey -wiped out in a total eclipse of sadness. 'Our times of disaster' mixes more angst with a soundtrack of carcrashes? By now you'll guess this isn't an easy listening disc. Maybe one of the lyricists had recently suffered a break up. I'm not sure but the mood is bleak. Spanish tv fades in and out. Listening to this disc is like dreaming your way through Madrid at 3.am with your heart ripped out. It's their finest work to date and invents a new euro-music. Half American despair, half chanson, half cantautore blues. It sounds like the record The Walkabouts were thinking about but never managed to pull off or the record Tindersticks would have made if their hearts ran with Spanish blood instead of pale ale. Black, very black. The genius pours out on the first Spanish language track 'la Noche/The night'. It's so dark it's scary. The mood is sustained, accordions slip in and out, guitars are plucked, electronica buzzes and spits. 'Suburban empty movie theatre' gear-shifts from sadness to a crazy waltz. It's the sound of suburban Spanish youth clutching at American straws, the impossibility of climbing those white lights into the American dream. Strings and guitar and a Spanish monologue dissolves like a tracking shot into a crackling organ and 'sand falling fast in a glass bell'. Premonitions of death? It builds like Cave or Brel. If there's a finer record released in the European theatre of song or is that territory this year it will have to be miraculous. This is art of a high degree. Knowing, fractured, sad and very very blue. Don't file it with pop music -put it alongside Gainsbourg, Tarkovsky, Bunuel. It's ART. Great art. 'Each day you exist you have more crowns to clean'. 'Should I be doing something else, in these times' they say at the end? No you are doing more than fine. 'Arde' translates as 'it burns' and indeed it does. Hearts on fire.
Bucketfull of Brains #58 2001