Dan Kelly
Dan Kelly's Dream
(Shock)
This is like a well-done underdog.
It's too cluttered. There's too much going on. That Dan Kelly is a wordsmith should be quite apparent to even the most unfamiliar with his muse: his lyrics sprawl all over this album, spilling out of its insert - clever, intricate, tongue-in-cheek wee beasties that flutter about all round Australia and wider abroad as well, often quite perturbed at the effect humankind's folly seems to be having upon the world, and always ready with a zeitgeist-referencing quip. "I write adventure short stories, then I have to get down to colouring them in," Kelly explains on the accompanying, very wordy, press release. By his own account, Kelly is inspired by coal power, solar power, Spiritualised, the apocalypse, Ray Davies, Ian M Banks, dust storms, hot yoga, fishing trips, bushfires, mining companies, ice freaks, record freaks, Queensland, Africa, Fleetwood Mac... and if this list is starting to read like a 2010 version of 'Subterranean Homesick Blues' then that's probably to the good.
Dan Kelly's Dream is the third part of a triumvirate, that began with 2004's Sing The Tabloid Blues, which had an array of very able Melbourne-ites providing the music, and continued with Drowning In The Fountain Of Youth: words this confused and psychedelic and ecologically aware have to be a part of an ongoing something, and I'm not knocking Dan Kelly for that. Dan Kelly's Dream begins with the memorable, if somewhat nonsense, lyric "American Apparel had a special on khaki / With a matching balaclava stitched in Northern Italy..." and if you're intrigued by that then Dan Kelly's third full-length might well be for you.
Good luck.
The slightly self-deprecating, slightly swaggering, manner of singing reminds me of the original Jesus Of Cool, Nick Lowe, the man behind so much of the early Stiff Records output. Dan seemingly reckons himself to be some distant relation - maybe the Cleric Of Cool? That's fine. So Dan Kelly and his words have it going on. Fine. He's a wordsmith, and if the wordsmith wants to create music that makes the wordsmith think he's all grown up like the wordsmiths of the Seventies then you can't blame him for that can you, after all Ringo Starr and Harry Nilsson must have had some great drinking sessions in their day. First track 'The Decommissioner' attests to Kelly's fervent belief that that must have been the case: to the sound of an overhead helicopter and breathless vocals, the guitars ooze a love for the debauched post-Beatles years that just can't be tamed.
But Jesus! There's so much going on. If Kelly is a wordsmith you expect that the focus of this third album to be the smart asides, and the skewering of religion and corporations. It's not. Far from it. The focus is the music, and the music is woefully overdone. 'Hold On, I'm Coming On' throws in everything including the kitchen sink in its determination to be as upbeat and ironic as possible, and the overall effect is to leave you gasping for air. Everything is polished to a shimmering, simmering sheen. Take the otherwise supple 'A Classical DJ At Dandenong Station', a song way too self-congratulatory to work. Every last word is enunciated, because you know it matters, and the manner is very mannered. It quite gets in the way. Doubtless the songs were all written spontaneously and without artifice the way every last wordsmith likes to think they are, but you wouldn't know it. This is no vintage Dylan or Neil Young. Dan Kelly's Dream is so mannered; there's no abrasion here at all. 'The Catholic Leader' starts off promising enough with its cascade of old-school vintage radio guitar lines, like M. Ward without the voice or instinctive grasp of when to let go, but it soon falls into line with a thumping great wodge of sound, and - man - I never knew kitchen sinks sounded so tuneful.
There's one detour in this otherwise linear journey: the 10-minute long 'Poisoned Estuary Jam', featuring The Drones' Dan Luscombe on piano, wherein Dan Kelly shows himself just as in love with the same damn My Bloody Valentine record as the rest of Australia, with the added bonus of a guest appearance from the drums from Galaxie 500's cover of 'Don't Let Our Youth Go To Waste'. It's way odd, because for several minutes there's no vocals at all.
Too much effort, not enough understanding.
Everett True