Album Reviews
Movies
Concert Reviews

Top 10
Resources
Contact Us

Lost Songs 95-98  Artist: David Gray Label: IHT

On the day that I purchased Lost Songs 95-98, I watched its creator David Gray on Top of the Pops. There between crap rap and pretty faced fashion pop, including Kylie sounding just like she did in 1987 but her face looking as if she is now well old enough to know better, was this Welsh man who has worked his butt off for 10 years to become an overnight phenomenon.

It is quite a story. In 1991 the young Gray released an album that was as big a threat to the throne of Bob Dylan as there has ever been. Yes, sure there have been many new Dylan’s declared over the last three decades but Century’s End is a spiritual, socially observant, political and emotion punch that came with a lyrical nimbleness that really should have been declared as genius. "Let The Truth Sting" was a quite exceptional piece of poetry and "Birds" was the paradigm definition of the indifference and moral inertia of twenty years of Tory rule.

The follow up album Flesh was as articulate and powerful but Hut hadn’t had the check out tills ringing to match the artistic value. So for his third album Gray moved to EMI America and released songs that seemed to be aiming at a little bit more pop accessibility. Sell, Sell, Sell failed to achieve anything apart from a few covers on Mary Black’s Shine album and Gray was suddenly but not surprisingly in a world where good loses out to sales without a record label.

For those of us in from the beginning (well I actually arrived after Flesh), it looked bleak. And then the match turned. Like the opposition hitting the post or missing two penalties this losing of a recording contract turned Gray’s star around. He went into his bedroom and started experimenting with loops and beats and on the tightest of budgets released a nine track album in Ireland where for some reason there was a bit of a following. I am sure that though the songs were of the highest quality that he saw it as a stop gap in order to work out what might come next. It certainly helped him work that out.

Irish DJ, Donal Doneen took the album to his heart and suddenly week after week these slow burning songs like "This Years Love," "Babylon," and "Please Forgive Me" started picking up airplay. Because of at least a couple of discerning DJs in the world today and a whole lot of word of mouth, White Ladder became a slow but burning seller that turned into an eight platinum disc raging fire. I saw the first Olympia gig during this phase of growing popularity and during a performance that I personally thought suffered from being his first big venue gig I was amazed to see a sold out audience to sing every word with an enthusiasm that would not have been out of place at a Boyzone concert. By this stage, Gray too must have been somewhat disbelieving. From his career grinding to a halt and the emotional struggle of his parents splitting up, he was now on the cusp of the big time. Soon his album would be cracking other territories and the rest is history culminating in Top of the Pops.

This new release Lost Songs 95-98 actually has its origins in that period without a contract and his parents splitting up. It’s Gray’s Blood On the Tracks with lashings of his trademark melancholy but this man more than any other songwriter has a wonderful habit of making melancholy a window into seeing the wonder of life. It never seems to get to Leonard Cohen levels of self pity because it is just so beautiful. 

"Flame Turns Blue" has been in the live set for some time and is a very good bridge for those who have entered the fray with White Ladder. This opener could have sat as happily on that album as it has in the live set with Clunes gorgeous brushed percussion giving it that late night groove that Gray seems to create effortlessly. Clunes presence also appears on "As I’m Leaving," "Falling Down the Mountainside," and "A Clean Pair of  Eyes." Tim Bradshaw’s piano caresses, particularly "Mountainside," with a spine tingling splendor. Elsewhere it is a stark, stripped back sound though melody and wordplay clothe them all in Solomon's finery, apart from a couple of instrumentals. Gray’s sense of wonder is a constant presence even in the more downbeat themes and in the end either by conclusion or benediction we are left on "A Pair Clean of Eyes" with a sense of real hopefulness that there can be a new dream as our hero talks to God and says,

                And before the might 
                Of all that’s seen 
                I’ll raise my head 
                And wake to dream 
                With a pair of clean eyes 

The packaging of the album is a very visual expression of how well Mr. Gray has been doing. The minimalist cover of the cheaply done White Ladder is replaced with a book like hard cover and a beautiful book of photographs and lyrics. The future has indeed been awakened to a most surprising of dreams. The hope has to be that popularity and fame and financial security does not cause him to have to compromise his artistic vision to keep selling. As the man himself sang on What Are You on the Flesh album

               And what is that you’re wearing 
                Money’s ugly confidence
                You sacrificed the poem of your imagination 
                For these pounds and pence

The release of Lost Songs suggests the man is in control of his destiny but time will tell.

So he is saying that Lost Songs is not a new album in the strictest sense of the word. It is a stop gap between the White Ladder and whatever will come next. As the dates in the title suggest it predates White Ladder but if you are thinking that it might mean it is inferior in songwriting or performance then you have not got a proper grasp of this man. I have searched for the weak track in his entire catalogue. Lost Songs is a superb addition to the anthology. After all White Ladder was supposed to be a stop gap and only released in Ireland. Is there a secret here?

Steve Stockman 07/13/2000