Just what do you think you're doing, Dave?

As a reviewer, I'd like to think that I do a pretty good job of keeping with the times. Whenever an established artist that I like has a new record in the works, I usually know about it months before its release. Heck, back in the heyday of Napster, I'd usually have heard most or all of such an album before it saw the light of day as a commercially available recording. But somehow, I've been a little behind the times on some of my favorite artists lately, hence my surprise when my roommate informed me that he was looking forward to the new Dave Matthews record. In my ignorant excitement, I exclaimed, "Oh, cool, the Dave Matthews Band is coming out with a new record." But he corrected me by informing me that it would just be Dave Matthews this time out. Huh? Why wasn't I informed?

Well, Some Devil dropped a few weeks later. The title and the cover photo of Dave glancing suspiciously over his shoulder seem to say it all regarding the content of this record - it's a personal account of Dave dealing with former lovers and exorcising his demons and so forth - pretty much the same stuff you'd expect if you've followed Dave and his lively band over the years. It should come as no surprise to existing fans that the lyrical focus is pretty much the same here while allowing the music to take on drastically different forms, because the main difference between this and most of the DMB's output is the lack of the band and their much-lauded extended jam tendencies. No doubt, fans like me who were originally hooked by Boyd Tinsley's electrifying violin solos, Leroi Moore's sexy flute and sax interludes, and Carter Beauford's unbelievably complex drumming are gonna have a hard time adjusting to their absence - though we might consider the oft-lambasted Everyday as an opportunity to help wean us from our dependence on them.

It turns out that what we get in their absence is a bit of a surprise. It's well known that Dave himself is no slouch on his own instrument, the acoustic guitar, and with the band removed, one would assume that he'd be left to turn out an array of bare-bones acoustic performances with his buddy Tim Reynolds. They've done entire tours together, so this would be a reasonable expectation. However, what Dave seems to have done instead is to form another band as a means of stretching himself artistically. That will sometimes mean not as much of a focus on the acoustic guitar as some of us would like. Tim Reynolds is included in the new roster of players, but he's definitely not a focal point. Dave's longtime friend Trey Anastasio (lead singer of Phish) offers an electric counterpoint to Dave's acoustic noodling (though Dave is no stranger to the electric guitar either), as well as a little keyboard here and there. The band is rounded out by Tony Hall on bass and the Rev. Brady Blade on percussion. And The Dirty Dozen Brass Band even drops by for a guest appearance. I'll admit I'm not familiar with these players' work outside of this album, but they definitely help to give Some Devil a kinship with the DMB's music while not seeking to duplicate their style.

In the end, though, Dave is the captain of this ship, and it's his lyrics and melodies that ultimately determine whether these songs sink or swim. Given that he's reprising most of the roles he's played in songs before, this doesn't turn out to be a problem. From hormonal lover Dave, to fear-of-death Dave, to drunk and lonely Dave, to meandering train-of-thought Dave, to surprisingly spiritual Dave, all bases are covered here. Ultimately, that's what makes Some Devil believable as a solo debut - it's like hanging out with an old friend you've known for years and yet never sat down and talked with one-on-one until now because you and the rest of the guys were too busy horsing around together.

Dodo
Once upon a time, when the world was just a pancake
Fears would arise that if you went too far, you'd fall...
Unlike any DMB album, this disc doesn't open with an urgent vocal, acoustic guitar riff, or drum cadence. It chooses instead to fade in gently, setting a contemplative mood as a playful, repeating guitar line provides the backdrop for Dave's usual squeaky musings on life. Here he's wondering exactly what it was that killed the last dodo bird, and if that has any connection to the way that mankind will someday render itself extinct. That's a classic Dave Matthews quandary if I've ever heard one! Ignorance and a fear of the unknown seem to be at fault in Dave's worldview - it's amusing in a subtle way when he purposefully messes up the rhythm of the song as he sings the line, "Why would you play by the rules?" The song is filled out by some smooth sax playing - not sassy and fiery like what we're used to hearing from Leroi, but a nice touch nonetheless.

So Damn Lucky
Frozen heart, screaming wheels
Does that screaming come from me?
If any track on the album could be construed as vintage Dave, this would be it. A lilting, circular acoustic riff carries most of the song, hearkening back to some of DMB's polyrhythmic songs that have generally ended up being my favorites - "You Never Know", "Satellite", "Drive In Drive Out", etc. I think the song is in 6/8 time, and the rhythm never falters, but the way the beats are accented during different sections of the song is how it manages to fool the listener into thinking the rhythm has changed. The song seems to be about a car crash that Dave survived, and how "everything's different" in the light of pondering why his life was spared. Dave retells the whole thing in a very conversational tone, how he was driving along and pretty much off in his own world and them BAM! He hit a corner going too fast and his life flashed before his eyes. Conservative listeners are probably going to be put off by the word "damn" being used in the song's title and the phrase "Oh my God" that shows up in the song's chorus, but in the context of some of Dave's more recent spiritual musings, I would actually take the "Oh my God" to be a sudden cry for help rather than a blasphemous exclamation. In either case, this song has an extreme amount of hook value and an entrancing rhythm, and it blew me away when Dave and his new band performed it on Saturday Night Live. It joins P.O.D.'s "Alive", Iona's "Today", Radiohead's "Airbag", and the Barenaked Ladies" "Tonight Is the Night that I Fell Asleep at the Wheel" in a growing list of cool songs inspired by car accidents.

Gravedigger
Now you should never have to watch your only children lowered in the ground
I mean, you should never have to bury your own babies...
In true Dave fashion, this song was road tested quite a bit before ever making it to an album. Listening to the dry percussive intro, you'd almost think it were an unpolished demo, with Dave's gruff, offbeat growling about dead people setting the tone (don't worry, it's nowhere near as creepy as "Halloween"), but the song soon gets "plugged in" as an electric guitar and stronger percussion join the fray. It's definitely one of the darker songs that Dave has written, but it's also one of the most creative lyrical devices he's ever used. He reads off people's gravestones and muses on what their lives must have been like, coming around time and time again to the realization of his own mortality. When he pleads during the chorus, "Gravedigger, when you dig my grave, could you make it shallow so that I can feel the rain?", you can almost see that rain pelting him from above (he seems to have a bit of an obsession with water falling from the sky, doesn't he?) I think the chorus actually provides a bit of a disappointing resolution to the verses, which sound like they're leading up to a more poignant observation, but then, Dave tends to sound better when he's not being heavy-handed about a certain topic anyway. An unexpected "funny" moment comes along during the last verse when, after establishing a pattern of naming off the years printed on each gravestone and then rhyming the next line with those numbers, he sets up the word "trapeeze" at the end of one line, making us expect the number "three" at the end of the next, only to inform us that the person lived from "Nineteen forty to nineteen ninety... TWO!" Indeed, life is often shorter than we expected.

Some Devil
You said always and forever
Is such a long and lonely time...
Surprisingly, the first track on the album that thrusts Dave out into the solo spotlight doesn't feature an acoustic guitar. Instead, it's just Dave and the old electric. Imagine what "The Space Between" would sound like if the rest of the band had never joined in and Dave was just left to sing his lonely verses all alone, and combine that with the drunken loneliness of "Grace Is Gone", and you'll get this song. Dave seems to be confessing that he's trapped between "some devil" and "some angel" here, and this belies a sort of "The devil made me do it" attitude in reference to his drinking. But at the same time, his earnest vocals and the silence that they echo off into make you feel a little sorry for the guy, and willing to believe this apology to the lover who is fixing to leave him.

Trouble
Here I stand, head bowed for thee
My empty heart begs you, leave me be...
Dave's confession continues here as light percussion and atmospheric guitar work pick up the pace a little bit - this song manages to float right on through without leaving too much of a mark. Dave seems to have turned from pleading with his lover to pleading with temptation itself here, and that amounts to quite a few spiritual references as he begs, "Trouble get behind me now, trouble let me be", and later seems to address God with the plea "Pray your mercy shine". The song has been frequently been compared to U2, and while I'm not seeing it so much in the actual music, there is that vague sense of taking age-old spiritual sentiments or lines borrowed from hymns and recasting them in a modern, anthemic context that I guess would trigger such a reaction from some people. I personally think Dave's no stranger to the concept, and so I don't necessarily see this as out of the ordinary for him.

Grey Blue Eyes
Stone has pulled me down
But my faith has got me bound...
Trey Anastasio co-wrote this soulful little number with Dave, and of course that gives Trey the chance to hem it in with some subtle electric noodling - it's quite tasty, actually. The song is dragged down a bit by Dave being unable to decide whether he wants to growl or croon in some places, making his unpolished vocals sound like they're coming from a much older man (though perhaps he was going for a similar effect to the one he used in the eerie DMB composition "The Last Stop"). Some fans have rightly mused over whether this song is yet another heartbroken plea to a former lover by the name of "Grey", and if so, I'd have to say it's well beyond time to let it go, but given that Dave writes these songs and lets them evolve for years sometimes before actually recording them, I guess that criticism would be a little unfair.

Save Me
He said "every whispering wind and second counts"
Oh, maybe if you walk, but you should drive around...
Dave and his collaborators bring in a little of the "jam band" spirit on this one - it's driven mostly by percussion and grumbling electric guitar, but it takes on more of a Gospel feel towards the end. Here Dave describes encountering a man of faith, who, from his description, sounds like a modern incarnation of John the Baptist. Dave is intrigued by this man and asks time and time again, "Save me, save me, mister walking man". While Dave's lyrics are cryptic in place, he does seem to be building on the same plea for a higher power to rescue him from the dire depths that he began in the powerful "Bartender". This time around it's just a little more upbeat and funky. What's really perplexing is at the end, when, by way of some soulful guest vocals, the man seems to reply to Dave, "You might try saving yourself". It kind of reminds me of God' whole "Be the miracle" speech in Bruce Almighty, but I'm not entirely sure what Dave's getting at there.

Stay or Leave
You used to laugh under the covers, maybe not so often now
But the way I used to laugh with you was loud and hard...
Against an interesting backdrop of light programmed percussion and mouth sounds, Dave and Tim paint a lovely latticework for a modern update of the infamous "Say Goodbye". At least, the two songs seem connected in my mind, since "Say Goodbye" is basically the most compelling ode to a one-night-stand I've ever heard, and "Stay or Leave" is a melancholy musing over a temporary fling that both parties knew couldn't last forever. He really does a good job of capturing the feeling of invincibility that lovers often feel in this song ("Wake up naked drinking coffee/Making plans to change the world/While the world was changing us/It was good, good love."), as well as the powerlessness that often comes with being left behind by such a lover. Once again, Dave and Tim pull of the whole "changing the time signature without changing the tempo" trick that worked so well in "So Damn Lucky", almost fooling the listener into thinking that the song has converted from 6/8 into 4/4, but if you listen carefully, you can still detect the syncopation underneath. This one oughta give John Mayer ballads like "St. Patrick's Day" and "Come Back to Bed" a run for their money.

An' Another Thing
Stay a minute just to hear you waitin'
And no one confine her
Sweet and tender, won't you go out again?
There are a few tracks on this album that leave me feeling like Dave's off in his own little world and not making much sense to the people on the outside, and this would be one of 'em. I guess a solo album is a good time to get such things out of your system. This would be the moment where Dave gets left alone to work his magic on the acoustic guitar, but it's not the same rich picking and strumming we're used to - instead, he plucks out muted notes, giving the song an extremely sparse feel. It actually makes me think of water dripping in a dark cave. His lyrics are extremely incoherent here, reminding me of the outro to "Big Eyed Fish" as he cries "Rain on my head" while a bed of strings swells up in the background. He also seems to refer to the older songs "Little Thing" and "Recently" at a few points, but overall, the song is extremely abstract. That actually wins Dave a few cool points in my book, even if it means some people will be annoyed by the unanchored feel of the song, Dave's insistent falsetto, and the five-minutes-plus running time.

Oh
I hear you still talk to me
As if you're sitting in that dusty chair
Makes the hours easier to bare...
The album is starting to feel a little disjointed at this point, as the last song transitions into a brighter, more traditional acoustic ballad that seems like a partial rewrite of "Angel" mixed with a little bit of "When the World Ends" (mostly because he opens the song by gleefully declaring "The world is blowing up"). I have a hard time connecting with this one just because the lyrics are a bit juvenile - "I love you oh so well/Like a kid loves candy and fresh snow/I love you oh so well/Enough to fill up heaven and fill hell". It's not like I'm opposed to Dave writing simple, happy love songs - heck, "Crush" even made me swoon - but this one just seems like a bit of an afterthought, especially given the oh-so-not-descriptive title.

Baby
Some might tell you there's no hope in hell
Just because they feel hopeless
But you don't have to be a thing like that...
OK, Dave, you're really pushing your luck by putting two lazily titled songs back to back on an album. However, I'm thinking that this one might be about an actual baby (makes sense, his wife had twin babies last year). He sings the song as if it were a gentle lullabye, calming the worried child by telling her she can be "a ship in a bottle set sail", whatever that means. The pretty strings add a bit of charm, thought that's offset by Dave's lyrics being a bit fatalistic. The odd thing is that the song feels a bit long even though it's only about two minutes and twenty seconds.

Up and Away
Before you came, you know I didn't care
It's just a game I play...
Dave and the boys attempt a bit of a reggae groove on this song, and it's fun, if not totally convincing. Some sunny, high-pitched organs add a bit of flavor to the mix (I'm thinking that flavor must be Caribbean rum), and the guitars become more and more propulsive as the song takes off. Lyrically, it's an extremely lightweight piece, simply stating how a lover makes Dave feel high, which is certainly ground he's treaded before. But I'm sure it'll evolve into a fun extended live jam if treated properly.

Too High
The minutes pass, the hours are gone
So hard to find your way alone
As the slow hands quicken...
One of the album's most intriguing pieces is saved for last - Dave once again employs a muted picking/strumming technique, this time with the electric guitar, shrouding the listener in a mysterious, angular chord progression. I think being fatalistic works best for Dave when the music is darker and not when he's veering off topic in the middle of a love song or something, so it's natural that this song would snag my attention. This track works much like some of the best stuff from Before These Crowded Streets, building in intensity as it unfolds, pleading with the listener to live and love and make the most of things before "the slow hand quickens" and the sand in the hourglass runs out. Things get extremely dramatic later in the song when a flurry of horns breaks in, revealing the light at the end of a tunnel to be an oncoming train. This lead into an interesting orchestral jam in 10/8 time up until the song's abrupt end. It's a simply chilling piece.

Gravedigger (acoustic)
Dave probably had trouble deciding whether the final, fully produced version of "Gravedigger" was actually better than this bare-bones version, so he decided to give the fans a little more and tack this one onto the end. The softer mood gives him the opportunity to reign in the growling a bit, though it also mutes some of the passion found in the "official" version. I'm also a bit baffled at the inclusion of strings here, since they mostly play nice and they kind of work against the song's somber tone. I figure, if one of Dave Matthews' darker song is going to have stringed instruments in it, they should be more urgent and creepy like they were in "Too High" or the Kronos Quartet's work on BTCS, or they should be played by Boyd Tinsley. Period.

As if that little acoustic track wasn't enough to whet the fan's insatiable appetite for acoustic variations on Dave's material, the limited edition of this album also comes with a bonus disc featuring five acoustic songs performed live by Dave and Tim, just like old times. As a matter of fact, two of those tracks are the DMB classics "Jimi Thing" and "Seek Up", which are kind of redundant here since they can be found on the 1999 release Live at Luther College. I know the audience loves 'em, but if you're only gonna have five tracks, I'd rather hear songs I've never heard unplugged before. "When the World Ends", "Grey Street", and "Stay or Leave" fit the bill, thankfully, with those last two being standout performances (even if "Grey Street" is slowed down a tad). "When the World Ends" annoyed me on the album, and manages to annoy me even more in a live setting where Dave's awkwardly blunt sexual lyrics are met with hoots and hollers from the audience. I guess I just get annoyed with an audience that gets so easily excited whenever Dave comes to a lyrics that mentions drinking, sex, or smoking pot, as if they didn't know it was coming. I can't blame Dave for that - he just writes what's on his mind, and he and Tim play it all fabulously even if I might question the lyrical value of some of the supposed "classics".

I can see why existing DMB fans might be somewhat nervous about Dave doing a solo record. Some Devil certainly isn't going to satiate all of them. And I had to get used to it as well. It's probably easier to make sense of this with Busted Stuff as a bridge in between the solo album and the DMB's most commercial work on Everyday. So if you used to like the DMB but have been out of the loop for a few years, I'd suggest catching up with their latest studio album before graduating to this one. The irony is that I might like this album better than that one - but I still, think Busted Stuff is a better starting point, and depending on what you like/dislike about that album, you'll probably be able to gauge whether Some Devil is worth your while.

ALBUM WORTH:
Dodo $1
So Damn Lucky $2
Gravedigger $1.50
Some Devil $.50
Trouble $.50
Grey Blue Eyes $0
Save Me $1.50
Stay or Leave $1.50
An' Another Thing $.50
Oh $0
Baby $0
Up and Away $.50
Too High $2
Gravedigger (acoustic) $.50
Grey Street (acoustic) $1
When the World Ends (acoustic) $.50
Jimi Thing (acoustic) $.50
Stay or Leave (acoustic) $1.50
Seek Up (acoustic) $1
TOTAL: $16.50 (with bonus disc); $12 (without bonus disc)

Website: http://www.davematthews.com

Great Music to Play While: Driving - but pay attention to the road!

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