Album Reviews

Better late than never to discover this family of fanciful, faith-based music makers living in Clarksburg, New Jersey, a small hamlet located between Trenton and Point Pleasant on the New Jersey shore.

Led by 33 year old Daniel Smith, the oldest of five brothers and sisters, the group has released multiple albums and singles (most of which are available on LP and 7”) starting back in 1995, under a variety of names: Danielson, Danielson Famile, Tri-Danielson, and Br. Danielson. The enterprise began in 1995 as Smith’s senior thesis while a student at Rutgers.

Ships, issued last Spring under the Danielson name, attempts to bring together all the artists with whom Smith has previously worked (including Deerhoof and Sufjan Stevens) as well as those with whom he wished to work with but hadn’t yet.

The music making spilled over beyond the confines of a single LP to a series of limited edition 7” singles some of which were engineered by Steve Albini and recorded in his Chicago studio.

When you first encounter the opener, “Ship The Majestic Suffix,” you may think you’re hearing a children’s record, but dig in and you’ll realize you’re hearing the wide eyes, not of childhood, but of religious devotion—an exuberant, optimistic variety that’s unlike the guilt-driven, fire and brimstone strain brought by America’s settlers that still holds sway in Southern America and is currently creeping North as welcome as bird flu.



Now, being an agnostic at best, you’d think this would be an icky turn off for me, but quite the opposite is true. As with Sufjan Stevens, Danielson’s devotion is based on a personal relationship he’s happy to expose you to rather than beating you over the head with his righteousness and your lack thereof. Read the lyrics and you’ll read about “Our captain, riding throughout these heavens, bringing peace.” But don’t think Mr. Smith doesn’t live in the real world because he follows that guy in the sky line with “We’re shipping out our men again, oh I pray it will end.” The song points to the short-term reality on the ground and the transcendence of the almighty.

The tunes, many of which touch on having one’s faith tested, ricochet from music hall to Gilbert and Sullivan, to revival hall, to early Broadway, to yes, unstructured ‘60s folk-psychedelia ala The Incredible String Band, never landing long enough in any one court to be so identified.

If you’re a fan of The Arcade Fire, you will hear an easy to identify similarity in some of the arrangements and melodies, as well as the overall musical drift, not to mention the pleasant gagging falsetto screech of Mr. Smith’s, to the sound of that not so secret Canadian band. Not having heard previous Danielson albums, I can’t say who came first, but I’d bet The Arcade Fire keyed off of Smith’s work.

Grand yet homemade, child-like yet sophisticated, Smith’s compositions and their “live in the studio” performances (it sounds that way anyway), are difficult to pigeonhole, which is what helps make this exuberant, adventurous record so charming and surprising.

The good sound is an added bonus, as you’ll discover when the stylus hits the grooves of the opening tune and the live drum sound and panoramic chorus spreads across a wide-open natural-sounding soundstage (created by digital reverb I’m sure, but judiciously applied). If your first thought is Junior High School musical production that would be about right for a first listen but off the mark if that’s what you continue to hear after the repeated plays you’ll surely give this delightful record.