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Someday You Will Find A Home Review
Tracy Morrow & the Magi Chippie
(Headless Actor)
Listening to Tracy Morrow's last CD, Morning Is
the End of the Day, conjured a dramatic impression
of eavesdropping. On that record, Morrow's dissection
of old loves, old friends and old troubles so intensely
took its subject matter to task that one was left with
the overwhelming impression of having listened in on
a church confessional, being a fly on the wall at a
12-step support group's breakthrough meeting or being
on the receiving end of a suffering lover's voicemail
lament. In short, Morning Is the End of the Day
made Bruce Springsteen's stark masterpiece Nebraska
sound like "Walking on Sunshine."
Never fear, Tracy Morrow—the nom de plume used
by Buffalo-based vocalist/guitarist Bill Nehill, "due
to insecurity issues" according to his myspace
page—has not dropped his demons on his new effort,
Someday You Will Find a Home. Instead, the
songwriter has draped his tortured tongue around eight
new paeans of mournful melodies, songs that bear witness
to several hundred sleepless nights logged since Morrow's
last "diary entry." Lest the reader be concerned
over value for their dollar, those eight tunes clock
in at a staggering 43.5 minutes.
As was its predecessor, Someday was recorded
by soundboard maestro Steve Albini at Electrical Audio
in Chicago. This time around, Nehill is accompanied
by the Magi Chippie (guitarist Dave Gutierrez and bass
player Tom Dagonese). The quiet dynamics added by these
sympathetic conspirators brings an impressive new dimension
to the songwriter's "intricate sad stories"
(copped from the song "Please Don't…").
Gutierrez and Dagonese deliver intricate acoustic guitar,
acoustic bass and backing voice accompaniment to Nehill's
requiems, fleshing out the spare song structures. At
times, Nehill's fragile vocal delivery recalls both
the soaring falsetto of Neil Young and the gravelly
baritone of Leonard Cohen. The Magi Chippie respond
to both voicings in kind, playing delicate lead lines
and near-whispered backing vocals as the songs dictate.
While sonically sweeter than Morning, the subject matter
of the songs on Someday hasn't gentled one
whit. "Cold Silver Necklace" is a point-blank
indictment of a first love who has gone on to grow up
by rejecting "the dream that you have come to hate/but
for the rest of your life you will so hopelessly chase,"
and the stunner "Dual Diagnosis" is every
bit as haunted as its title implies. Yet it's not all
dour doomsdays on Morrow's new record. While the bulk
of the record possesses a worldview that could be described
as bleak at best, the album's last track, "All
That I Have…" turns heart-worn resignation
into a virtue.
(Mark Norris)
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