It says something about the power and longevity of music made in the past that today’s artists still find in its rich sonic seams of influence and inspiration to mine. How many of today’s crop, I wonder, will be instigating ideas in music makers minds 50 years hence?
And whilst I do not want to paint this latest album from Ian M Bailey, aided and abetted by his songwriting and arrangement partner Daniel Wylie, as a mere pastiche of past glories, far from it, it does shimmer with the same sonic warmth as the music made by the likes of David Crosby, Gram Parsons, and a number of Laurel Canyon luminaries.
Sadly, the opening salvo, “Rooks,” is as poignant today as it would have been written at any time in history, a reminder of the real victims of war, juggling images of the trenches of the ironically named Great War, a timeless and timely song. Such horror scenes are swapped for ideas of redemption, as the graceful and gorgeous “I’ll Be There To Save You Now” comes to the rescue of those lost at sea, perhaps literally, but just as equally metaphorically, but either way, beautifully.
And if “Deep Blue Water,” a song that drifts delicately on the sonic currents, underlines the fact that there is a fluvial and maritime theme to the first half of the album, the desert becomes the focal point as it proceeds. “Welcome To The Desert” polishes a raw rock abrasiveness with suitably cosmic ambiance, “Don’t Let The Garden Die” is an openly honest call to environmental arms, and the hushed and heavenly “The Desert Could Be Mars” reminds us that if we can live in such harsh places, perhaps the idea of living on Mars, or beyond, is not too far fetched after all.
The album is an adventurous search for answers in the wild places of the world, far from land on the vast oceans or far from water in the desert’s scorched earth. It is perhaps in such challenging solitude that our minds are truly free to process life, search for answers, and see our existence for what it is without all of the noise and confusion. And if you can’t get to such places for yourself, at least you now have the soundtrack to such meditations.
