James William Hindle - s/t
(Badman)
Simple things are often the things that are the hardest to appreciate. It’s
even harder to create them. Some of the most ubiquitous songs of the past 30
years are nothing more than a few select words sung over a few select chords.
They’re simple to recreate, but difficult to emulate, and certainly not so
simple to create yourself.
James William Hindle does well by taking the simple route, though. Six people
are credited with appearing on this album, but the arrangements are such that
even when there’s a multitude of instrumentation running rampant (as on the
string-laden “Remember My Markings”), the resulting performance appears as
straightforward and unadorned as a solo acoustic performance. Hindle’s voice is
equally simple--plain, unaffected, offering the words without any additional
pretense and drama.
Hindle’s first appearance of note came on the Badman Records tribute to John
Denver. It’s not surprising, then, to note the country flourishes on “The List
of You and Me," the appearance of Tarnation’s Paula Frazer as a back-up vocalist
(on “Sparky Marcus”), or the cover of Glen Campbell’s “Less of Me” that
concludes the album. Given Mark Kozelek’s association with the Badman label, it
isn’t surprising to note a distinct similarity to the Red House Painters.
However, the bathetic drama that typifies the best Painters songs is nowhere to
be found here. The shyly dour note struck by Hindle’s version of the Bee Gees’
“I Started a Joke” best typifies the mood of this album. “I started a joke
which started the whole world crying, but I didn’t see that the joke was on me,”
he sings, wistful, content. If you’re in the mood for such contentment, there
are many things you could listen to that won’t satisfy as much as this album.
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