Written by: Dave Cantrell

There’s hardly a day goes by in the insatiably curious life of a music writer (i.e. rabid fan) where it’s not made freshly clear that, despite the countless hours spent perusing countless sources on the web or on the walls of of record stores, you can’t only not hear – or even hear of – everything worth hearing but have that realization freshly slapped across your face on the unrelenting regular. But…but! The one (rather gleaming, frankly) upside to that otherwise droll reality is the almost daily likelihood that some heretofore unheard entity’s years-long unheardness will, somewhat perversely, turn out to be the proverbial ‘chock full’ of discoverable delights, a prospect exemplified by the arrival a number of weeks ago of the latest – which is to say fifth – full-length from Boston-based The Grand Undoing, the nom-de-rock of the man standing in the center of the TGU project, Seth Goodman.

Now in its fifteenth year, The Grand Undoing not only shows no sign of succumbing to its own name but rather emerges on this latest full-length with an intrinsic strength that, with its sterling roster of supporters (see below for the crew entire), puts an almost nonchalant paid to that whole ‘aging process’ nonsense as the tone and tenor of the tracks on the – ironically? – entitled Songs for the Sleeping pretty much defy that too often too easily – lazily? – drawn metric our culture tends to apply just generally but most pointedly to the rock’n’roll realm. Which is to say ‘Fuck that, let’s rock’ (albeit in a sublime and, yes, somewhat matured way).

The immediately yearnful opener “Sing a New Morning,” bracketed by a guitar tone that, even as it’s hard to say why, evokes something of a warm, electrified nostalgia that, for this listener anyway, brought back audio images of, I dunno, Jesse Colin Young opening up a sun-soaked Day on the Green in 1974, its effortlessly immersive feel sanding away the decades and there I was again, eighteen and eternal and that, it has to be said, is one hell of an introduction to an artist I should have discovered years ago but, as ever, ‘better late than never’ rules the day. And the even cooler thing? That track, warm and alluring etc, is but the first of multiple jewels.

There’s “Creature,” rising like some studio-built golem, the bass (that bass!) the drum the synth colluding around Goodman’s vocal, the entire vibe raising to the rafters where it will, no doubt, hover cloud-like for the rest of eternity (which is to say, yes, it’s a keeper, that one, but then again ain’t they all). On its heels comes “The Knowing,” a track aimed at tackling the unhideable dilemma we all face knowing what we know, can’t help but see and in turn, in fact, can’t help but carry around with us like some cloud that casts its shadow but never drifts away. Yes, heaviosity in a pop song, we suppose, but given what we’re all, especially in this moment, dragging behind us every waking hour how can that be a surprise.

Following – and adding still more to the elemental essence that suffuses the dark dreams hovering above these Songs for the Sleeping – comes “Black River,” bass (again)-forward, the delicate presence of piano lending an actually-not-so-delicate emphasis to the chorus and, really, that’s the central gist of this album, bringing via exquisite songcraft and the ensemble playing to match an ostensible sense of warmth within which come echoes of warning, of somber observation, a living-on-the-brink you can dance to, if you will. It’s there in “The Sun is Stranger” that, in its slower, almost drone-ish melodicism made this listener think of Anthony Newley in that it’s both intimate and universal in tone while exhibiting juuuuust the right soupçon of an implied, everyday mystique. In short? It’s a bit of a quiet stunner, that one, which, to be honest (and as you’ve no doubt already guessed), is not exactly a rare quality here. Couple more examples, you ask? Sure!

Check penultimate cut “Savior” that sports something of an aspirational bar band quality in that it rather romps while reaching for the stars, a dualism especially present in its extended coda that those of us listening here in the office hoped would never end. And speaking of endings, “Now I’m Going Home” carries that unwritten but universally embraced ‘make the last track especially memorable, make it count’ tradition with such unstinting aplomb it could well be held as the textbook example of that vaunted custom, not least due the plaintive sentiment at its center – “I’m broken down and now I’m going home” – that speaks to that universality wherein something of a yearning fatalism turns us back toward the comfort of our roots and, truly, what more to ask from a pop song or, come to think of it, as a bookending mate with that opener mentioned above, well, yeah, that’s how it should be done.

Throughout Songs For the Sleeping” there’s this kind of ensembled perfection at work (and again, check said ensemble below; we couldn’t not include them here seeing as how bloody essential they are to this album’s success), one that, when matched as it is by a level of production – self-, along with Ted Powers – that doesn’t just invite the word ‘sterling’ to mind but rather demands it. No surprise, then, that among the songs not noted above is “Adventurine,” defined online as a “translucent, sparkly variety of quartzite.” Swap the word ‘quartzite’ with ‘songcraft’ and there you have it, the very crux of this album. [find the album here]

CREDITS

Seth Goodman: vocals, bass, guitar, keys, percussion

Ted Powers: vocals, keys, guitar, percussion

Keith Jacques: vocals, guitar, sitar, percussion

Kurt Johnson: pedal steel, guitar, keys, lap steel

Dave Westner: drums, percussion

Dave Mattacks: drums on “Creature,” “Now I’m Going Home,” drums and piano”The Sun is Stranger”

Andy Plaistead: drums on “Black River”

Pete Donnelly: percussion, background vox

Pete Hayes: percussion, background vox

Peter Bloom: flute on “Now I’m Going Home”