The first new purchase of 2025 is Richard Dawson's latest release. I've spoken lots about my love for Dawson's musical world and this album doesn't disappoint.
Dawson's previous album in 2022 (three years ago? Really?) focussed on one apocalyptic track, of forty minutes. This album returns to a format of shorter songs and a stripped back, simple form.
Dawson's skill is in the simplicity of his songs, alongside the lyrical content, which is at once both complex and mundane in the narrative. Thus we have nine songs here about, if not everyday occurrences, normal human experience.
Bolt is a gentle tale of a lightning strike, just Dawson, guitar, and a barely discernable drum accompaniment, then Gondola, similar in sound, a mundane life story viewed from a twilight years' break in Venice. Daytime TV references litter the lyrics "Deal or No Deal, box number 17 is opened to reveal a wound that's never healed". Bullies is a tale of schooldays,, with a marchlike beat and a squawking saxophone, while The Question (it's "where are you going") is longer, with a lovely acoustic guitar intro, before a catchy theme kicks in, a spooky tale of ghostly apparitions in an old house. Boxing Day Sales, to me probably the most orthodox and commercial song (it won't be a hit single, don't worry, kids) here, is an enjoyable, if self-explanatory song. Knot is possibly the darkest song here, a mournful view of a wedding, excess alcohol and menace, punctuated by a wailing clarinet middle eight, while Polytunnel, about the joys of tending an allotment feels far more wholesome, simple and gentle. And the optimism continues with Removals Van, a gentle song of moving into a new home and looking forward. Final song, More Than Real, on which Dawson is accompanied by partner, Sally Pilkington, is the most heartfelt, developed and least obvious song, a tale of reconnection at the passing of a loved one, and it's a fantastic end to a lovely album.
I don't know if you'd call Dawson a folk singer, singing as he does about the contemporary, and eschewing traditional structures if they don't fit what he wants to convey, but even at its most accessible, it's always a journey, and an enjoyable one.
4* - it's an absolute joy to hear new Richard Dawson material, and it's as good as ever.
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