Jason Anderson - Tonight
Label: K Records
Released: 2007
Grade: A+
[[ buy it @ eca records ]]
Search on YouTube for Jason Anderson and you will find no official music videos with clean images and good audio quality. Instead, there are a handful of videos of Jason Anderson playing live at some venue or another. The audio sucks, but even in the crappy, small 425 x 350 pixel box that is a YouTube video can you feel the intense energy Jason brings to a show. Below the garbled lyrics and cutoff guitars, the images of Jason shine through loud and clear; him in the middle of a crowd of fans, the audience joining in for a back-and-forth chorus, or simply Jason jumping around on stage.
But why mention the unique selection of Jason Anderson videos the internet has to offer? Because with Tonight, Jason has become infused with a sort of energy not found on earlier albums. An energy glaringly apparent in every live show, but only hinted at previously.
In other words, this is not the Jason Anderson of New England or The Wreath. This is a Jason Anderson who has spent too long listening to Ted Leo & the Pharmacists and We're From Barcelona. Fall and Winter have come and gone, and it is now time for Spring.
That is not to say the sound is so different, just the feeling. Old Jason Anderson was intimate and lo-fi, with an upbeat song thrown in every now and then as a welcome anomaly. Soft songs to listen to as the snow fell, or as you drove home after a quiet dinner with an ex-girlfriend you never stopped loving. New Jason Anderson kicks it up a notch, adding horns and a chorus of voices screaming, clapping, and chanting.
This new energy hits right from the first note of the first track. The drum kicks, the saxophone busts in, backs off for a little while Jason and the piano sets the stage, then comes right back in to carry on a song just over seven minutes long that doesn't feel a second over the perfect pop 3 minutes.
For an easier comparison of old to new,take, for instance, "So Long", a remake of a track found on Jason's first album, New England. The original had Jason sing over and again the line "I'm watching you watching me falling over." Tonight's version, however, has the music slightly fuller and quicker, and Jason crying for four minutes the line "the best thing in the world is to love someone and they love you back." Or find the Jason of ol' hiding in "July 4, 2004", in which he asks himself "Oh Jason, are you still waiting?", only to answer "I will wait for you, and I always will!" Beneath the hand claps, drum beats, and distorted guitar, it is hard to tell if it is hurt or happiness you hear in his voice. Either way, he is definitely pouring his heart out and loving every moment of it.
(Would it be heresy at this point to name Jason Anderson this generation's Van Morrison? Naysayers should first listen to "Saturday Night", a song to rival Cat Steven's own "Another Saturday Night" or Morrison's "Domino".)
It is easy to classify the transformation undergone to create Tonight as one of tempo, but that does not do the album justice. Jason's music has always had the quality of making the listener seem involved, almost as if the song is being played just for them, and Tonight takes this to an even higher level. At a small show at Wayward Council, Jason gives a long introduction to "The Hospital", a track off his last album, saying, "Thank you so much for coming to the show tonight. And thank you so much for deciding that you wanted a part of your Tuesday to be this." Tonight seems to be Jason's "Thank you" to all those fans who couldn't be there that night, or any other night; those who he could not thank in person.
And to do this, Jason has done his best to package all his emotion and love for songwriting and performing into 43 minutes and 37 seconds. In the same introduction as above, he says, "because when I was young, I remember just how much these shows meant to me. And I'd go with my best friend, and we would leave dripping with sweat, our lungs hurting from singing so hard to songs we didn't even know the words to." It is a grand effort to try to convey the sort of feelings you experience going to those small, hot shows, where the world melts away, and it's just you and this great crowd of people all moving and feeling to the same thing. And it is an even greater accomplishment to succeed as well as Jason has with Tonight.
Disregarding the change in speed Tonight's songs come with, this is still a Jason Anderson album. It is still something that fits those long rides home at 2 AM. But maybe this time those tears aren't from remembering the past or hoping for the future. Maybe this time they are from Jason trying to remind you that any night could be the best night of your life.
by Spencer Sugarman
| by Susan @ 10 Dec 2007 07:29 pm |
| I agree 100% I saw him perform recently and I was floored. It was like we were all one family, or sitting around some campfire singing together. He is so inspiring to watch and listen to and sing along with. I would drive anywhere to get a little bit of that feeling back. This guy is worthy of al your acclaim and more. A+ for me too. -Sue. |