The performer is a tree. His face protrudes from the center of the trunk, his arms reach out from its sides to cradle and strum the acoustic guitar that stretches across its’ front. Fruit dangles from its’ bushy green upper half. He sings something called “Cutest Lil’ Dragon” in a pinched, melodic whine: “Get caught by the purity of truth/kick the dark horse in the tooth.” No, it’s not some kind of Sid and Marty Krofft flashback, it’s just Brother Daniel (aka Daniel Smith) from the Danielson Famile, spreading his musical gospel.
There were only a handful of souls on hand to catch the Danielson Famile leader’s solo show at the Metro Cafe Tuesday night, but those few witnessed a stirring and thoroughly odd performance. Daniel isn’t a tree, of course, but he performed from inside one, a nine-foot construction that symbolizes the “good fruit” his music bears. Accompanied by Sufjan Stevens ---who opened the show with a set of his intensely wispy folk songs--- on banjo and organ, Daniel sang, played guitar and a foot drum (concealed inside the tree) with startlingly singular homegrown folk verve. Daniel’s singing voice, like a child infuriated to the point of hysteria, and his songs, like “Sold! To the Nice Rich Man”, “Don’t You Be the Judge” and “Fetch the Compass Kids”, are odd Americana, but that oddness was endearing because it was so overwhelmingly heartfelt. More proof that in today’s often suffocating musical landscape, the music flowing from the mind of Daniel Smith is like the cooling shade of a sturdy tree.
Washington Post, 2002
