This is a personal site masquerading as a music site, or perhaps it's the other way around. I'm not a professional journalist, so I write here only when I have the time and inclination. I've been a music nerd for decades, and my tastes are constantly expanding, although at the beginning (seventies and eighties) I was mostly listening to metal and punk. There are years of live reviews here, plus one year (2011) when I endeavored to review every physical release purchased. Sometime during 2017, I burned out on trying to write about every show I attended, so currently the posts will be more diverse.
09/19/2020
Dalrymple "Make Believe" (Artist Direct, 2019)
Music is like an emotional lubricant, easing our passage through time, especially tough times. I continue to appreciate all of the musicians in my life, whether they be friends or people I know only through their recordings. I also appreciate that Bandcamp continues to waive their fees once a month, although it has definitely become a case of feast or famine for me, as I buy many things on the eagerly-awaited First Fridays but not much the rest of the month. Famine really isn’t the correct word though, because the beauty of recorded music is that one can listen to it again and again. I’m in the middle of re-listening to everything I own, mainly due to the fact that it’s easy to overlook things or forget about them entirely once a collection burgeons to a certain level. I think I passed that level years ago, but that doesn’t stop me from buying more. My tastes and musical obsessions change with the passing years, but revisiting music I bought in my youth is nonetheless rewarding, although sometimes expensive (as in, “I forgot how great this is! Why don’t I have everything this artist recorded?) At any rate, I have decided to once again attempt to get back into regularly reviewing recorded music, with relevant links of course.
Dalrymple “Make Believe” (Artist Edition, 2020)
Dalrymple is a new project which starts up where Lasher Keen left off. I’ve reviewed a number of Lasher Keen shows on this blog (here's a link to one of them), but so far have only gotten to see one partial Dalrymple performance, way back in August of 2018, which I didn’t review because I had gotten burned out on writing about every show I attended. It was the second show of a two-show night in Oakland and Berkeley, with the first being at Classic Cars West in Oakland with Luxury Skin (featuring the sultry stylings of Juliet Gordon, ex-The Classical), Cube, and others. Leaving that show, I frantically raced toward the Starry Plough, where Dalrymple’s set was already in progress. I remember being entranced by puppets, an eclectic assortment of instruments and styles, and in general a fascinating assortment of sounds and sights, like I’d wandered into a wandering minstrel show in an alternate universe. This was followed by the always-entrancing Faun Fables who, like always, entranced. That brings me to “Make Believe,” Dalrymple’s first recorded output under this name.
“Make Believe” is available as a digital download, a CD, or a beautiful double LP. The cover features original artwork featuring Dalrymple himself, appearing as a renaissance man (in both definitions of the term), with his head lit up by ideas and inventions and his Indian-diety-like extra hands clutching a plethora of instruments, a book, and a key. The inside of the gatefold has lyrics, illustrations (credited artists are Arthur Rackham, Sidney Sime, and Morris Williams (I had to Google Williams, and I’m glad I did). The illustrations on the inner sleeves are by Rackham, I think. Angie Holm is responsible for the back cover, an image of four hands beckoning from behind a partially opened door. There is also a bibliography, which helps illuminate the lyrics and provides pathways for fearless explorers who routinely ignore warnings of dragons.
If one doesn’t count the brief intro, the album is bookended by evocative memories of childhood in the form of the songs, In My Youth, and album closer Storytime. In between is a wild ride through folklore and myth, where we meet a disparate crew of characters such as Willy Wonka, Pan, Baba Yaga, and many more. The music is blessedly hard to pigeon-hole, which is as it should be. I hear renaissance prog-folk mixed with the jagged edges of East Bay art rock, wyrd folk, a touch of In Gowan Ring-esque whimsy, and the snarling sounds of Comus, if Comus woke up on the right side of the bed one fine morning. The Discogs entry for the album classifies it as medieval, neo-classical, operetta, and psychedelic rock. In short, we all hear different things through our personal filters. The list of instruments played on this record is daunting, so I’m not going to type it up, but if you, like me, enjoy the anticipation engendered by a list of instruments that is both lengthy and weird, this is a record for you. Dalrymple and James Word seem to be the two permanent band members, with a healthy list of collaborators (including the always exciting Nils Frykdahl (Free Salamander Exhibit and Faun Fables) and partner in rhyme Dawn McCarthy (Faun Fables), Colla Voce Children’s Choir, and Early Music Choir.
I can imagine whimsically entering an almost overlooked record store located on an ill-traveled side street, breathing in the welcome, musty smell of neglected stacks of vinyl and flipping to the back to find an oddity. The cover has ring wear and corners softened by age and neglect, but the illustrations promise wonders. Buying it for $1.99, I rush home and discover that I’ve found a lost private press masterpiece from the seventies. Searching online, I can find no internet presence. It’s as if the ambitious, crazed creators have retreated into another world somewhere, leaving behind the record I hold as the sole proof that they ever existed. The swirling mix of exotic instruments, great range of vocal styles (from children's choir to basso profundo, and back again), and purposeful abandonment of genre tropes is a refreshing to hear in these troubling times. In 2020 especially, I often wish I could retreat into a storybook somewhere.
My take on this album is that is centers around the importance of stories and storytelling. We are, after all, living collections of the stories we’ve been told and the stories we tell ourselves (not to mention the stories we’ve read), and these stories can determine how we relate to the world. The song, Morning of the Magicians, is a gleeful roll call of magicians both fictional and otherwise, with the common thread being inspiration. Where else will you see Alejandro Jodorowsky and Yoda rubbing shoulders. Yodarowsky? The perfect muse...
Elsewhere, in The Blessing of Pan, we are treated to the Colla Voce Children’s Choir singing about the Great God Pan, which always evokes Arthur Machen for me. Come to think of it, Algernon Blackwood often sprang to mind while I was listening, especially his novel, Prisoner in Fairyland. Again, this is the filter I see this record through. "Hoof beat, hoof beat..."
The lengthy The Trickster Ferryman is entrancing enough that I didn’t realize it was lengthy until I looked. With a title like this, one could be forgiven for assuming it’s about Iktomi or Coyote, or one of the other classic trickster characters from folklore and myth. It’s not though. It’s about Willy Wonka. In fact, the lyrics were written by Roald Dahl, and should be familiar to anybody who was read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or seen the original film. The propulsive rhythm of the song sluices us down an ominous tunnel, like a childhood fantasy gone unexpectedly dark. Suddenly we don’t feel so safe, and that’s okay, because now we’ve added to our story collection.
We are also treated to Dalrymple’s musical version of the W.B. Yeats poem, The Stolen Child. Here again we can hear (appropriately enough), the children’s choir helping weave the tale. I’m reminded that the first time I heard this sung was by Loreena Mckennitt, and despite the delivery being completely different, the magical effect is the same. This is the power of well-chosen words.
Dalrymple’s multi-instrumentality and distinctive voice, added to the gleeful, complex approach to the task at hand, produce unexpected juxtapositions of sound and story at every turn. It’s hard to pick a favorite song, and I imagine that any early favorite will shift in status with repeated plays. The aforementioned The Trickster Ferryman is excellent, but then again so is GogMagog, which sounds like a Mordor marching song. Whatever the case may be, this is obviously going to hold up to many repeat listens (I always listen at least twice before writing a review, and so far, so good).
Now I have All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth playing in my head. For better or for worse, we're more likely to remember our childhoods better than we remember what happened last week. If your childhood was traumatic, let this record be what you remember instead. It might be a start of the healing process.
This record is, I think, a paean to childhood and a celebration of the magical powers of stories. I wholeheartedly approve.
Buy the record and learn more by clicking the links below:
Dalrymple's website
Dalrymple MacAlpin's Bandcamp page (remember that Bandcamp is still waiving its artist fees on the first Friday of every month during the pandemic).
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