BELLACD396
Release date: 6 May 2013
Songs Cycled – a note from Van Dyke Parks:
This album is released on Bella Union 45 years from my debut album “Song Cycle” (when I was but 24). In both cases, there’s a maverick on the loose, with a highly personal set of tunes and instrumentals. All of them reveal an iconoclast tilting at windmills, railing at tyrants, barking at masters of war, and celebrating a shameless commitment to the very definition of ‘Americana’. As I was in my brunette era, at age 70, I’m found looking through the glass darkly. These new songs show more than a hint of an eco-politic. In fact, there’s nothing more precious than the song-form to revolutionize popular thoughts and practices that need a jolt of shock therapy. Yet, songwriters must work with a leger demain. A light hand and heart can draw more approval than a heavy-handed scold. My first aim is to entertain the ear with beautiful sounds. I try to do that as an arranger. These pieces reveal my best effort.
I’ve drawn from a grab-bag of American roots music, from the 19th Century forward. (It was, after all, ‘The American Century’). Yet this song-set goes beyond, and muses about ‘9/11’ and other self-inflicted wounds (‘Wall Street’). It explores the American bombing of Baghdad (‘Dreaming of Paris’), the chicanery of Big-Oil (‘Black Gold’). I insist that the song-form is the most potent political tool available. I learned as much from Woody Guthrie, Phil Ochs, and yes, Bob Dylan.
Still there’s time for folderol. ‘Sassafrass’ captures all I love about the youth I spent in the Smokey Mountains of North Carolina. It’s a roll in the grass. There’s the renegade arranger in that, reflecting my obsession for studio technique, sound- effects with tuneful percussion that I first heard in 1948, in the music of Spike Jones.
I guess I am like that rusty nail that sticks out, just waiting to be hammered down by an intolerant bastard, with no room for what isn’t rockin’ or classically elite. In truth, I embrace both those worlds. Guilty as charged, I’m wrapped in the flag, looking through the glass, at the world beyond… informed yet optimistic, in my dream escape. It hangs together well, as we must, lest we all hang separately.
I have so many contributing visual artists to thank, for coating it all so deliciously.