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Dirty Projectors is the alias for singer/songwriter Dave Longstreth, who had
debuted under his own name with the home-made
The Graceful Fallen Mango (This Heart Plays Records, 2002).
The lo-fi feeling was still prevalent on The Glad Fact (Western Vinyl, 2003),
that ranged from the cacophonous overture to out-of-tune accompaniments
to neoclassical ballads sung in operatic and punkish registers
(Ground Underfoot,
Glad Fact,
Off Science Hill,
My Offwhite Flag, Like Fake Blood in Crisp October),
far away from the center of mass of lo-fi
songwriters of the 1990s.
Three Brown Finches,
Proud of his vocal skills, Longstreth howled his compositions rather than
whispering them. Facing up his inner ghosts, he let his voice waver and
crack, rise and soar.
After the Internet release Morning Better Last (States Rights, 2003),
that collected unreleased material from three triple albums of 2001 and 2002,
Slaves' Graves and Ballads (Western Vinyl, 2004),
that collects the material of two prior EPs, refined the project
by adding the arrangements of a ten-piece chamber orchestra (the Orchestral
Society for the Preservation of the Orchestra) on a string of songs
(particularly On the Beach, Hazard Lights, Grandfather's Hanging)
that further enhanced the melodramatic quality of his performance.
On the other hand,
the second EP is basically the alter-ego of this ornate music, but ultimately
it sticks to the same loud and neurotic persona.
The spare Unmoved, Because Your Light Turns Green and
Obscure Wisdom focus on his lyrical side, and complement the
turbulent bard of the first half.
All in all, Longstreth comes through as a hybrid being,
like a cross between Andrew Bird and Sufjan Stevens, capable of vocal gymnastics that challeges
the dogmas of singing.
The Getty Address (Western Vinyl, 2005) is an over-reaching effort
that loses most of the captivating idiosyncracies of the previous albums
as it tries to live up to avantgarde compositional techniques and
post-modern deconstruction.
The songs are scored for cello octet, women's choir, wind septet and
digital cacophony. Not all of them work, but
Tour Along the Potomac,
Gilt Gold Scabs,
Not Having Found,
I Sit on the Ridge at Dusk,
Jolly Jolly Jolly Ego
rank among the most creative pieces yet assembled by the digital generation.
Rise Above (Dead Oceans, 2007) was a reinterpretation of Black
Flag's Damaged. Not just a tribute album, but a song-by-song
alteration of the original sound and spirit: lightning-speed
guitar riffs turned into orchestral passages, angrily
shouted refrains turned into crooning or multi-part vocal harmonies,
dissonance turned into muzak.
Rather than covers these are remixes, as Dave Longstreth takes an unlimited
number of liberties with the original material.
It almost sounds like an insult to the memory of a hero. A sort of post-mortem
censorship.
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