Papa M/Entrance - split 7"
(Tiger Style)
Proving his songwriting contributions to Zwan aren't too time-consuming, David Pajo plans on creating an audio tour diary, to be released as a series of CD-singles.
The first of these singles, entitled One, features one-off recordings done in his hometown of Louisville, his label's home of Chicago, and Bloomington, Indiana. The Bloomington song is an alternate version of "Beloved Woman" (from Whatever, Mortal) recorded by Dan Burton of Early Day Miners with guest musicians providing cello, violin, and hand-trumpet. The song starts off with a burst of Hitchcockian-tension—Arbogast falling down the staircase—but after that burst, the rest of the song simply swells and dwells, not really adding anything to the more intimate album version. The Louisville song is a really great cover of Rev. Gary Davis' "I am the Light of This World," turning Rev. Davis' uppity brimstone blues into a flowing, soothing, spooking mantra. Pajo delivers the song like a chant, adding a dense bed of sound behind his voice from the stray sitar strums at the beginning to the chiming electronics at the end. The Chicago song is a new original, "Flashlight Tornado," which shows great development is Pajo's ability to craft folk lyrics and acoustic guitar, but also moves him further away from ambience into pure folk.
Predating Pajo's audio tour diary is a split 7" with new Tiger Style artist Entrance (solo project of Guy Blakeslee of The Convocation of...). While Pajo's previous split single was a misplaced waste (with Unhome on Awkward Silence), this pairing works. Pajo's song is "Orange World"—an account of an orange-tinted dream. While it is less dense and developed than the songs on One, the guitar tone is warm and inviting. Entrance's song, "See For Yourself," is my first introduction to Blakeslee's solo work (which I guess is the reason for this split single). Blakeslee is able to turn just voice and guitar into a full, rich sound, however his voice is a combination of Robert Plant and Tim Curry in Rocky Horror Picture Show. Perhaps a little too much cabaret for the psych-folk idiom but interesting enough that I'd give his full length a chance.
By joining Zwan, one of the many things I inferred was that Pajo wasn't confident enough in his new folk-singer persona. Pajo's new singles, while not his best work, prove he has plenty of confidence, and his ability to create the modern folk song and bring old ones up-to-date is only increasing. Hopefully he'll find enough time in between tours to properly craft Whatever, Mortal's follow-up.
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