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My record collection consists primarily of 3 tiers which, from bottom to top, can be described as: “Mistakes,” “General Music,” and “Go-To Records.” Aside from paralleling nicely the women in my life, this system allows for a neat and organized way of choosing albums best suited to make the long drives of our expansive Texas landscape seem less lonely. As any serious collector or appreciator of music knows, the requirements for that top tier are nearly indefinable - more a feeling hidden somewhere deep behind the musical merits of an album than anything else. The Door To The Morning, as you may have already guessed, meets those exceptionally personal requirements. As anyone who’s driven the relentlessly open land between Austin and just about anywhere knows, finding another record for that top shelf is as welcomed as a Whataburger in the dead middle of absolute nowhere.
Before settling in Austin for 2005’s Beggar’s Blues, Weber, like most singer-songwriter types, criss-crossed the country, traveling from his midwest home westward to the Pacific and back in the pursuit of love and music, eventually recording his debut Naive Melodies. Though the past few years have seen him physically rooted in Austin, his music has yet to suffer the same fate; where Beggar’s Blues might have been billed as “Graham Weber and Americana-Themed Accompaniment”, The Door To The Morning showcases an evolution to a more complete sound, at least partially due to Leatherbag’s production credit. The instrumentation pushes and pulls on Weber’s vocals and acoustic guitar, audibly driving the emotional tension and transformation in Weber’s lyrics.
It’s no surprise, then, that the evolution characterizing Weber’s life and music is also a central theme to his lyrics. In the album’s opener, “Snow in July,” Weber looks forward, “Don’t worry it’s almost winter,” though certainly not without nostalgia for the past, which manifests itself as one of the most thoughtful lyrics on the album: “There’s a picture in my mother’s house, reads the way it did when I was younger,” he sings, “It’s funny, it’s funny how, I don’t recognize that fella now.” The instrumentation is energetic but laid-back, the bright piano and organ filling the hollowness of Weber’s voice like the warmth of a summer’s day (minus the snow, of course).
As the album continues, we see the themes of transformation and evolution further explored; “Candle’s So Close” invites us into “a long dark tunnel” that is to be the journey through The Door To The Morning. The energy of “After the Boulevard” matches that of the opener (Eleanor Whitmore’s violin takes a more prominent role here), but only to hide the darker admissions lurking in Weber’s lyrics. “Killed your only lover, from the inside out.” It’s hard to tell if his second-person perspective is chosen to emphasize the universality of his feelings or, more simply, to avoid admitting his own role as “killer.” Either is equally chilling.
Now, while I’ve never admitted this publicly, there was a time where my formula for judging new albums consisted of summing the parts directly influenced by Jeff Tweedy, the more the better. Childish as this method was (and too often still is�), Weber would’ve made the grades. Even the Bob Dylan comparisons seem justified in “Italian Lullaby,” both in vocal tone and cryptic, symbolic lyrics (there are far too many lines worth mentioning in these songs, and I’ll make all attempts to accurately represent the ones that matter most, or at least to me). The album’s sound, especially in this middle expanse, draws heavily on these and other influences, seemingly improving on everything I wished each of those influences did better. For example, his voice is far more approachable than Dylan’s, and he’s willing to prove his capabilities as a singer without sacrificing the edgy growl of his low register. Then “End of The Fall” conjures up the same openness, or perhaps emptiness, of the more experimental tracks on Being There (think “Sunken Treasure”), but never attempts to lose the listener, finding in itself instead longing harmonies “at a time when I prided myself on a bullet-proof grin.”
Following with the seasonal changes depicted on the album, “Field of Marigolds” welcomes Springtime with soothing imagery in probably the 200th solid lyric on the album (if anybody’s counting): “out past the spotlight of the fair grounds, out of range of the echoed auctioneers, there’s a pageant winner waiting for a tango, with a yellow blossom tucked behind her ear.” Both lyrically and musically, the song shines like the album I wish the Jayhawks’ Rainy Day Music had been - less perfection, more emotion. Completing the transformation are the introspective “King’s Highway” and then “Nevermind,” which poses the question infinitely inherent to Love: “If I owned up to my actions, would you ask me to get packin’, or smack me in the mouth and take me home?” It’s nice to know Weber has no better answer to offer than you or I.
Change, and the pain that accompanies it, may be the driving force behind the album, but it hides a more simple, barbaric quality: the mere connection of one human being to another. The connection of Weber to the characters of his past is present, yes; but more important is the connection between Weber and the listener, the connection that gives the music warmth, the same all too often simulated by a bottle of whiskey, that can only be realized in personal connection, in this case through music. Which might come close to explaining why we take music on long car trips, and why we can’t properly define what draws us to “those” albums. Either way, the connection is the responsibility of both the artist and listener, and Weber has most certainly fulfilled his part.
Websites:
www.grahamweber.com
Myspace
