Dave Smallen's Happiness: An Album Worth Listening To
Smallen has proven he can carry out complex and haunting compositions with tracks like Georgia, Can You Hear Me? on his freshman album with Street to Nowhere, and NYC off his sophomore album Everything Changes and Nothing Changes. But what makes his latest album remarkable is how he showcases perhaps an even greater range of emotion and thought on this album than in his prior ones. Take for example The Rain, which I think is the best track on the album.
Smallen sings the first line "My dad sold his car in 1972." With song writing and fiction, having a catchy first line is the hallmark to a good song. Hearing these first seven words, the listener asks himself, "Why did his dad sell his car in 1972?" This detail is something so specific, while being so inconsequential, the listener is immediately drawn in, wondering why his dad resorted to this action. Smallen quickly moves to the next line to answer the listener's question: "Yeah, he thought that he was headed to Vietnam."
The line rings out very American--involving a car and the Vietnam War. It seems very simple on the surface, but like the writing of Ernest Hemingway, or a Johnny Cash lyric, there's much more subtext behind it.
Smallen elaborates in the third and fourth lines, singing "But the sores on his hands and his eyes got him the pardon// And he walked out clear, instead he met my mom."
The power of this song is in its seemingly simplicity. Smallen condenses complex geopolitical events in his parents' lives into a simple 4-line lyric to start his song. His economy of words takes a seemingly inconsequential act--his dad selling his car--and transforms it into a framework to give a condensed history of his family for the last 4 decades.
This reminds me of the Johnny Cash line "I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die." or the Raymond Carver line "I'll tell you what real love is," spoken by Mel in "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love." There is a poetic quality to Smallen's lyrics in The Rain and his other tracks, and it's not until listening to them several times, that their soft sounds and meanings reveal truths to be discovered.
In addition to Smallen's lyrics that're as rich in meaning as they're fun to listen to, the packaging and distribution of the album mirrors the do-it-yourself ethos of the album.
A Chronology of Dave Smallen's album artwork
In his latest album, Smallen returns to his roots: his early music experiments in high school and college when he would spray paint, write on, and package each CD.
With his training in college in woodblock printing (which Smallen discussed in his Fresh Air radio interview), in his last 2 albums, he's carved a picture that represents each track into a block of wood. He then prints a picture from this wood carving and colors it in for his album artwork.
Below you can view a chronology of Dave Smallen's album artwork from 2001 to today. The list below is not complete; Smallen's other singles and EPs can be found on his website.
1. Street to Nowhere's Oakland EP (2001)
2. Street to Nowhere's 2nd EP, featuring Dead Cliché, Parkman Ghost, and Miss Rolling Eyes (circa 2004)
3. Charmingly Awkward (2005) and re-released by Capitol Records in 2006.
4. Everything Changes and Nothing Changes (2009)
5. Happiness (2011)
People do judge albums by their covers, and Smallen's trend has been to move away from the machine-produced stamped-out CD and show the physical album as an item to be coveted and cherished. His attention to detail in the music production is carried over to the presentation of the final product.
Dave Smallen fundraised for Happiness through the crowd-source funding site IndieGogo. He raised $5,171 to cover recording expenses for the album. Each contributor received a copy of the album with a personalized note. His woodcut prints were some of the most popular prizes, which helped him surpass his $4,000 fundraising goal.
Smallen has embraced the Web 3.0 era by moving online connections offline. He has connected with his fans through his music, shows, and artwork. He lets listeners hear his music for free on Bandcamp, and then requests $1 per song if they want to purchase.
Smallen's method of personalizing the music exchange process and showing the means of production behind his albums, combined with the personal touch of hand-made artwork allows for his fans to better connect with him and his music. His fans aren't interacting with a publicist or record marketing executive, but the artist himself, who shows that he cares about his music--not only in the professional production of his albums, but also in their physical appearance. I'm excited to see what Dave Smallen has in store next!
- To learn more about Dave Smallen, visit his website: http://www.davesmallen.com/music.html.
- Dave Smallen will also be featured in my forthcoming book Oakland in Popular Memory: Interviews with 12 Cutting-Edge Artists from Oakland and Beyond.
