The past week has featured a selection of wonderful Scottish artists, several of whom admire and have been influenced by this American singer-songwriter whose voice and simplicity of style has power and profundity. Callahan released his first 12 albums (starting in 1990) under the Smog name, and his last five under his own name. His early output was experimental and instrumental, and what makes that even more surprising is his ability to write and sing lyrics that have such strong, acerbic sensitivity, black humour, and a deep-voiced, easy, almost throwaway profundity, combining deep emotions in a matter-of-fact storytelling. And all of this framed in minimal, yet powerful music.
The first of these songs comes from his Smog album from 1999, Knock Knock, which is among his most jaunty, an has echoes of upbeat Lou Reed or Jonathan Richman, but pertains to children witnessing dark and disturbing family scenes seem not to understand adult conversations, but actually do. The second comes from his 2009 Callahan album, Sometimes I Wish I Were An Eagle. It is about writing and the creative process but is reportedly inspired to be about the hard-hitting crime writer James M. Cain, author of The Postman Always Rings Twice. It is laced with gentle irony, in that the narrator started off looking to write about the wind and the trees, but "things didn't pan out as planned". That's life, and death, indeed.
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
The type of memories
That turn your bones to glass
Turn your bones to glass
Mother came rushing in
She said we didn't see a thing
We said we didn't see a thing
And father left at eight
Nearly splintering the gate
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
The type of memories
That turn your bones
Turn your bones to glass
And though you were
Just a little squirrel
You understood every word
And in this way
They gave you clarity
A cold-blooded clarity
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Though how can I stand
And laugh with the man
Who redefined your body?
How can I stand
And laugh with the man
Who redefined your body?
Those cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times
Cold-blooded old times.
I started out in search of ordinary things
How much of a tree bends in the wind
I started telling the story without knowing the end
I used to be darker, then I got lighter, then I got dark again
Something too big to be seen was passing over and over me
Well it seemed like a routine case at first
With the death of the shadow came a lightness of verse
But the darkest of nights, in truth, still dazzles
And I work myself until I'm frazzled
I ended up in search of ordinary things
Like how can a wave possibly be?
I started running, and the concrete turned to sand
I started running, and things didn't pan out as planned
In case things go poorly and I not return
Remember the good things I've done
In case things go poorly and I not return
Remember the good things I've done
Done me in.
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