Album review: Dave Rawlings

Published on Sunday 22 November 2009 22:13

DAVE RAWLINGS MACHINE: A FRIEND OF A FRIEND **** ACONY, £10.76

UNTIL now, singer/songwriter Dave Rawlings has remained somewhat in the shadow of his partner Gillian Welch, but here he takes the lead for the first time with a collection of beautifully wrought Americana, most of it co-written with Welch.

The second half of the album is dominated by their trad mountain music style, but Rawlings's plaintive tenor is best showcased on I Hear Them All, a throwback to old-school protest songs, shot through with compassion and tolerance.

Another empathetic gem, To Be Young (Is To Be Sad, Is Too Be High), was written with Ryan Adams, and elsewhere Rawlings sensitively splices Bright Eyes' Method Acting and Neil Young's Cortez The Killer into one brooding epic.