Far too many songs seem to include lyrics merely as an afterthought as if it is enough to have a good tune, and once you have that, the lyrical component can be thrown together at the last minute. That’s how it seems to me, anyway. But that is to miss a golden opportunity. Why, having chosen songwriting as your medium to talk to the world, would you not bother to say anything?
What’s excellent about Michael Walsh’s new one, “A Man From No Time,” is that far from being a secondary consideration, his lyrics here have at least equal billing and almost feel like they are the plot line to a film yet to be made.
The protagonist of the piece has visited a Memphis spirit medium who reveals to him his past lives—as a French Revolutionary, a member of the Peruvian insurgents The Shining Path, and a teenage boy during the Alabama Civil Rights riots of the 1960s. If someone like Stephen King had come up with such a plot, Hollywood would be falling over itself to get the film rights.
Having come up with this fantastic tale, he delivers it via a punk-infused storm of guitars, driving the imagery home via incendiary salvos and abrasive rhythms, distorted, brooding bass lines, and an unfussy but brilliantly and infectiously functional drum beat.
Someone needs to develop this story, write the book, create a Netflix series, start a franchise, and, obviously, get Michael Walsh to write the soundtrack. And they need to do it now!
