featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 13, 2023
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
In 2006, NPR's Robin Hilton publicized a list of his ten Best Living Songwriters. Of course, he raises no eyebrows by starting with names like Dylan, McCartney, Springsteen, then cements his indie cred by including Vic Chesnutt, Stephin Merritt, and PJ Harvey. Hilton's list earned its notoriety by awarding the Number Ten slot to David Dondero. The itinerant songwriter has spent the ensuing years wearing that mixed blessing like an albatross. Fact is, revisiting Dondero's ten previous studio records in preparation for this piece has been a joy, especially the one-two-three punch of Transient (03), South of the South (05), and Simple Love (07).
As the pandemic took hold and brought touring to a standstill, Dondero settled into a loft located above the Fluff & Gravy garage in Portland. There he partnered with label producer/engineers John Shepski and Juniana Lanning to prepare and record Immersion Therapy (Fluff & Gravy, August 18). He has called the collection a grieving process, navigating the slings and arrows of the Covid years, in addition to mourning the suicide of a close friend. It's as raw a pandemic songbook as we've heard to date.
The singer's distinct voice quavers on the vulnerable "At Least _ Not Alone", the intimate sound of fingers finding acoustic frets the only accompaniment: Almost everyone I know is crumbling from within / Lost within their own skin / At least I'm not alone. Dondero has crowned himself an expert at anxiety, even as he recognizes the solidarity in being alone together, as opposed to being alone alone. The album's title cut addresses the pandemic phenomenon of being forced into desolation when you were that way all along, portraying an entirely unsuccessful group therapy session at a bowling alley: The man sprayed the shoes with the disinfectant / Some kid looked confused / Quite expectant / Cause the air hockey table wasn't blowin' no air. Shepski's piano pairs with Dondero's electric guitar on the typically bare bones arrangement.
Since his earliest solo work in 1998, David Dondero's music has waxed and waned, from solo to full band, from unadorned to the more produced. The constants throughout have been his voice as a singer and as a writer, the former reportedly inspiring a young Conor Oberst to embrace his own fractured delivery. The songs on Immersion Therapy fall in line with the occasionally quirky confessional folk of Jonathan Richman or Bill Callahan, simultaneously irreverent and heartfelt. Dondero sings of a social experiment on the garage-folk of "Recipe To Be Lonely", baiting friends to contact him: I didn't try to call you / And it turned out you didn't try to call me too. Paul Brainard adds spacious pedal steel to the ratcheting percussion of "You Need Your Space", a busier arrangement that pauses for a little more space at the tune's halfway point: You need your space / Like southeast Oregon / Central Nevada / Wilbur, Washington. "Monarch Highway" provides one of the record's most interesting musical moments, an acoustic tumble with fluttering strings and Anna Tivel's fiddle.
The death of the songwriter's artist friend casts a cloud of concern over Immersion Therapy. On "Sandsculpture Tombstone", amidst the sound of a foghorn and ocean waves, Dondero witnesses the construction and the erosion of an impermanent memorial. He addresses his friend's fragile mental health on "Wrinkles Of Your Mind", the unpolished piano and guitar adding to the air of patience and compassion: When you get out of the hospital / They put you on the street / To go back within the wrinkles of your mind. Adding harmonica and chimes, the beautiful "Nacre Pericardium" tells of the singer serving as pallbearer in transporting his late friend's sculpture across the country.
One of the ten Best Living Songwriters? Well, David Dondero is responsible for a song that goes through my head just about anytime I'm in a public space where people are prone to arrive with pets in tow: "Not Everybody Loves Your Doggie Like You Do". Even in its seemingly unfinished state, Immersion Therapy is consistent with the span of Dondero's admirably idiosyncratic oeuvre. The record's jacket photo portrays a familiar mask set afire in a barren desert scape, a mask that he has worn for several publicity photos, that he had brought on stage and encouraged audience members to personalize. As with these pandemic songs and remembrances through which David Dondero bears his anxious, antisocial, big-hearted psyche, perhaps that burning effigy signifies both an end and a beginning. About "After the Pandemic", almost lush with electric reverb, he writes: After the pandemic, we will get together again. Does that idea horrify you?
- Margo Cilker, "With the Middle" Valley of Heart's Delight (Fluff & Gravy, Sep 15)
- Kyle Nix & the 38s, "Poor Boy's Heart" After the Flood (Bossier City, 23)
- Ryan Bingham, "This Life" Watch Out For the Wolf (Bingham, 23)
- Emmylou Harris, "Love Wore a Halo (Back Before the War)" More Than a Whisper: Celebrating the Music of Nanci Griffith (Rounder, Sep 22)
- Charles Wesley Godwin, "Family Ties" Family Ties (Big Loud, Sep 22)
- Jolie Holland, "Haunted Mountain" Haunted Mountain (Cinquefoil, Oct 6) D
- Jason Eady, "Misty" Mississippi (Old Guitar, 23)
- Bonnie Prince Billy, "Behold! Be Held!" Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You (Drag City, 23)
- Jenni Muldaur & Teddy Thompson, " We're Caught Between a Love and a Love Affair" Once More: Jenni Muldaur & Teddy Thompson Sing the Great Country Duets (Sun, Sep 8) D
- Joshua Ray Walker, "Cheap Thrills" What Is It Even (JWR, 23)
- William Matheny, "If You Could Only See Me Now" That Grand Old Feeling (Hickman Holler, 23)
- Nicki Bluhm, "Baby Don't Go (ft Sam Blasucci)" Nicki Bluhm Sings Cher (Bluhm, 23)
- Shakey Graves, "Big In the World" Movie of the Week (Dualtone, Sep 15)
- Goodnight Texas + Rainbow Girls, "Tough" single (2 Cent Bank Check, 23) D
- Jerry Joseph, "Man Who Would Be King" You're the Man Who Would Be King (Cosmo Sex School, Sep 29)
- Jonathan Wilson, "The Village Is Dead" Eat the Worm (BMG, Sep 8)
- SUSTO, "Cowboys" My Entire Life (New West, 23)
- Tre Burt, "Traffic Fiction" Traffic Fiction (Oh Boy, Oct 6)
- Low Cut Connie, "King of the Jews" Art Dealers (Contender, Sep 8)
- Allison Russell, "Snakelife" The Returner (Fantasy, Sep 8)
- Kym Register + Meltdown Rodeo, "Blue" Meltdown Rodeo (Don Giovanni, Aug 18)
- Cordovas, "Change the Way You Talk" Rose of Aces (ATO, 23)
- Briscoe, "Sparrows" West of It All (ATO, Sep 15)
- Esme Patterson, "Circles" Notes From Nowhere (Esme, Oct 10) D
- Molly Burch, "Unconditional" Daydreamer (Captured Tracks, Sep 29)
- Slaughter Beach Dog, "Summer Windows" Crying Laughing Waving Smiling (Lame-O, Sep 22)
- The Natvral, "Summer of Hell" Summer of No Light (Dirty Bingo, Sep 1) D
- Florry, "Hot Weather" Holey Bible (Dear Life, 23)
- Ratboys, "Morning Zoo" The Window (Topshelf, Aug 25)
- MJ Lenderman, "Knockin'" single (Anti, 23) D
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