Slaid Cleaves
Broke Down
2000
“It’s a bitter wind/in your face every day/it’s the little sins/that wear your soul away” sings Slaid Cleaves on “One Good Year”, and those lines capture the Austin based singer/songwriter’s characters in a nutshell: they notice the little details that bring the big picture into focus. Like his subjects, Cleaves has strived against long odds, and unlike most of them, he seems poised on the brink of success. Broke Down, the follow-up to 1997’s No Angel Knows, merges Cleaves’ evocative lyrics with straightforward country folk settings to produce the best work of his career.
Perhaps Cleaves has evolved into such a skilled storyteller because his life story reads like one of his songs. He began “busking”--playing for change on the streets--while attending college in Ireland in 1985, then formed a successful rock band (Moxie Men) after returning home to Portland, Maine. After the band dissolved, Cleaves moved to Austin and shortly thereafter won the prestigious Kerryville New Folk Award in 1992. “It opened the folk door for me,” Cleaves told the Austin Chronicle, “but it was never a door I was interested in. The vast majority of singers were aspiring to be like James Taylor. I always thought of folk as Woody Guthrie and Hank Williams.” Countless gigs and two homemade CDs followed, but he seemed no closer to success. Cleaves even resorted to experimental drug studies (as human guinea pig) to help pay the bills. His break came when Rounder Records showed interest in the demo that eventually became as No Angel Knows.
Cleaves brings it all back home on Broke Down. Commanding singing
(sometimes recalling the sly phrasing of mid-70’s Bob Dylan) and sharp country folk settings-- captured and sometimes played by producer Gurf Morlix-- illuminate the lyrics. From the portraits of melancholy barflies in “Horeshoe Lounge”, to the title track’s automobile metaphor for a life derailed, to the gorgeous rendition of Del McCoury’s “I Feel the Blues Moving In”, Cleaves gives a commanding performance. As the narrator of “One Good Year” admits, “I’ve been chasing grace/but grace ain't so easily found”. Few understand that sentiment better than Slaid Cleaves.
also recommended:
Robert Earl Keen Walking Distance
Jimmie Dale Gilmore One Endless Night
Steve Earle and The Del McCoury Band The Mountain
Music Direct Magazine, 2000
