American Water
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Description
In the past the Silver Jews were commonly known--and often dismissed--as a Pavement side project. Not anymore. On American Water, D.C. Berman comes into his own as both a poet and a songwriter, effortlessly tossing off lines like the album-opening "In 1984 I was hospitalized for approaching perfection" while the band plays on, unimpressed. --Randy Silver
Description
"All my favorite singers couldn't sing," Dave Berman of the Silver Jews idiosyncratically speak-croons on "Blue Arrangements." To make the point hit hardest, he doesn't sing so well himself, but it's well-taken: from Lou Reed to Bob Dylan, John Cale to Palace, conventionally "good" singing isn't the most necessary element in effective storyteller-troubadour music. Berman is a prose poet by day and rocker by night, and his lazy-sounding, countrified, skeletal, yet invigorating music celebrates the union of word with sound in a manner simultaneously classic and seldom heard. It's hard not to like a record that begins with the line "In 1984 I was hospitalized for reaching perfection." Thankfully, Berman doesn't trade in the wordplay he and collaborator Steve Malkmus are so expert at. If only Pavement's Brighten the Corners were this relaxed, full of melodic hooks, and cagily profound. --Mike McGonigal
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