Just a quickie as I’m having a real busy day but at some point in the future maybe I or one of my fellow bloggers can come back to this.
Can you believe that Elliott Smith has been dead for almost five years now? Yup, Five years in October. In that time whenever I’ve heard anyone who I think is just trying to be a blatant copy of Elliott I have shrugged and thought ‘Ok, you’re an Elliott Smith fan, so what’? and moved on. However, I think Jeff Hanson is different. Although he is going to get compared to Elliott I feel he brings something else to that style of music, his voice for a start. When i heard the first lines of nothing would matter at all I thought it was a woman, something that happens often apparantly. Paste magazine described it as Angelic falsetto if Wikipedia is to be believed. He also has less multitracking on his voice, something that Elliott was well known for but also his new album is more varied, especially on the dreamlike track No never mine where his voice is unbelievable ! As I say this album deserves a lot more coverage than I’m giving it now but anything is better than nothing. He’s on the brilliantly named kill rock stars label and his brand new album Madam Owl is out right now. Buy it.
And from his 2005 album..
Thanks for this Geordie, I’m going to download me some Jeff Hanson pronto!
I am thinking the “major” indie labels may be having a scramble for the “unique” voice artists as it is definitely becoming huge in certain circles. I just posted about Death Vessel’s new album over on Slowcoustic and low and behold another “falsetto” male singer….small world, isn’t it!
S.
jeff hanson put out his first record “Son” in 2003…was the “falsetto” thing cool then, i doubt it.