- Dan Reeder
Dan Reeder
Oh Boy Records
By Danté Dominick
 There are different motivations
for making music. Music was a different form of entertainment
in the days before radio and television. People participated
in music directly as opposed to ingesting music from a distinct
performer-listener one-way route. The abundance of packaged music
available everywhere has had two results: fewer individuals play
their own music as a means to simply entertain themselves and
the overwhelming motivation to learn music is now to have your
music heard by others.
Dan Reeder is a painter. He works more hours than he wants
to, he has a wife and three kids. Just like anyone else, surely
there are times that life's obligations become taxing and so
a distracting hobby becomes a very good thing. And so Reeder
began to write and play his own songs. He never aspired to hit
the stage, nor was he hoping for a record deal. It was, plain
and simple, his hobby, his personal time. It all started when
he and a friend "were looking for something fun to do."
No, he didn't set out to learn some music...he had to make
the instruments first, after all. Yeah, that's right, make the
instruments. Says Reeder, "I spent about two years making
guitars, ukuleles, basses, electric guitars and wacky unplayable
instruments." C.F. Martin & Co. may recoil at their
visage, but, not only do they work, the rest of us are extremely
impressed. And when Reeder says, "my guitar," it means
a lot more than his instrument.
Soon he had a computer that could handle audio recording.
Only problem was he had no pre-amps or mixers. So Reeder built
some. "Meant I had to learn some electronics," he offers.
Reeder became fascinated at the ability to sing harmonies
with himself. These new toys were sure working out to be a lot
of fun. "When I ran out of campfire songs, I started writing
my own."
While escaping reality Reeder pens bluesy-folk tales that
are often consumed with reality. This is not so ironic. Early
blues was an extension of chain-gang work chants. The only way
to truly remove oneself entirely of struggle and stress would
be to remove oneself from the Earth. This is not a compelling
option, and so confronting our troubles directly and turning
them into song has been a common therapeutic practice for ages.
If you can sing, mock and chortle about something it can't be
all that bad, after all. Soon enough you find yourself feeling
much better and singing about eating food, chasing women and
watching the rain. This is the case if you're Dan Reeder, at
least.
"I'm not a musician," Reeder plainly states today.
But the hobby that started with building a guitar in 1995 resulted
in a collection of songs recorded to compact disc in 2003. A
monumental do-it-at-home DIY project: Reeder wrote, performed,
recorded, mixed and produced the entire project himself. Now
what to do? He had no plans to do anything really, but did burn
a copy and sent it to John Prine as a thank you gift. Reeder
found solace in Prine's songs for decades and wanted to offer
something in return. In a handwritten letter to Prine, Reeder
explained he made the disc, "pretty much for the hell of
it...hope you like it."
It turns out Prine didn't just like it...he loved it. When
Reeder noticed an e-mail from Prine's record label, Oh Boy Records,
in his "Inbox," he thought it was especially polite
they should send a thank you note to him. He opened the message
to discover a contract offer. Prine loved the disc so much he
released it as is, imperfections and all. Initially available
via direct order only, Dan Reeder received considerable
praise and will hit retail stores mid-March. "I'm still
stunned," says Reeder.
Its beauty is its stark minimalism. On most tracks it is only
Reeder's vocals and his homemade guitar. Bluesy-folk dominates,
but hints of doo-wop, nursery rhymes and...uh...Dan Reeder are
apparent. He fingerpicks simple progressions and kept audible
flubs (and background hiss) intact. His lullaby voice (surely
honed from singing his children to sleep) entreats listeners
to pay close attention. The full, lush richness stemming from
the layered vocal tracks, when added to his low-key scruff, is
mesmerizing.
Dan Reeder, the disc, is 18 songs brief. The forty-two
minute run-time is made possible by a few, very brief one or
two sentence observations. Other songs unfold in the more standard
formula of multiple verses and chorus. In both formulas Reeder
demonstrates ability to play with words and thoughts like a child
playing with a ball. Some of the sparsely worded songs are remarkable.
A Japanese haiku conveys more substance in 17 syllables than
a three-hour speech by a politician and so, too, do Reeder's
one or two-minute odes convey far more emotion than any 20-minute
jam ever recorded.
Take "Work Song." Expletives can be a very useful
dialogue feature. When used liberally they loose all of their
emphatic power and the word basically becomes a hiccup, akin
to speakers who fill their conversation with "like"
incessantly for no grammatical purpose. Reeder plays the gamut
of his homemade instruments on the album, but for "Work
Song," he set them all down. He simply claps and repeatedly
sings one line, "I got all the fucking work I need."
It is superb! He places the emphasis on the word "all,"
holding it long and layering himself similar to a round. That
one line repeated over and over, emotional and surprisingly uplifting.
A bond is created, some joy in sharing common feelings with a
stranger and some humor is inescapable as you sing along, "I
got all the fucking work I need." Soon I answer, "damn
straight!" and wind up sitting on my front porch like a
vegetable. The happiest fucking vegetable in the garden, mind
you.
Other songs settle without the lightheartedness. "The
Tulips on the Table" is among the most wrenching songs I've
heard in some time. Similarly wrenching, but like the best of
hymnals in offering a sense of hope amidst despondence, is "Fight
My Way Out." Both are more poetic and developed, but their
ideas are so blunt they make me shudder. The obvious intimacy
of the recording adds to the effect. On the contrary, "Here
in the Kitchen" is the greatest paean to pleasure from nothing
(and thereby everything) I've heard since Jerry Jeff Walker's
(1976) "Getting By."
Dan Reeder abounds with original quips that come off
like familiar axioms. The bizarre, unconventional approach and
structure notwithstanding, I found myself endeared to this record.
So interested, I checked up on Oh Boy Records and learned the
story behind the work (as outlined above).
I swear I obliviously muttered, "oh boy," but I
may be making that up in my mind now.
www.ohboy.com/danreeder.html
dominick-at-rockzilla.net
|
