Seattle musician Alex Catchings, perhaps inadvertently, makes an interesting point, challenging the idea that to be a serious musician you have to come up the hard way, or that to make music of value you have to have struggled for your art. However, having spent years as a ‘starving academic’ before really pushing his music at an age when many might have thought the moment had passed, may slightly undermine this point.
But now, having made a living in education, he took his bedroom recordings into a professional studio and, with the help of the great and good of the music world, has found his music well received by an audience he never thought he would find.
And why not? Off-Ramp is a gorgeous album, one built on the same subtleties and seductions as the likes of Iron & Wine, Bon Iver and Elliot Smith. The title track sets the perfect tone, bravely opening not with an obvious sucker punch to grab the listener’s attention, but with a gentle indie-folkscape that evolves into a gorgeous duet with Laurel Bentley, poised and perfect. Poise rather than power every time!
‘Mongrel’ is a more brooding soundscape, tackling the increasingly difficult issue of not fitting into some people’s idea of community and looking for your own place to call home, whether that be cultural, societal, spiritual, or something else entirely. ‘Bargain Basement’ might not exactly be dream-pop in the generic sense, but it is beautifully dreamy and eminently and poppishly accessible…which is probably better anyway. ‘Medication’ is a gentle slice of acoustica, and ‘Like the Nineties’ proves that even though this is an album full of delicacy and deftness, Catchings is equally adept at fun and funk; he can do groove as well as grace.
Okay, it might be a cliché, but Alex Catchings’ story makes an obvious point. It’s never too late to explore a new path. All those little hobbies and artistic endeavours you undertake for your own peace of mind might, with a push and a shove, open doors you never thought possible.
“It is better to travel well than to arrive”, so said a wise man. I would add that travelling well requires you to wander far and wide and take whichever path, byway, scenic route, or dirt track makes you happy. And who knows where some of those paths might lead!
