Matt
Hannah – Dreamland
Songwriters
like Matt Hannah are a different breed. Hannah ascends into rarefied air with
his second full length release Dreamland. Let the Lonely Fade, his 2014 debut,
served notice that a promising new songwriter had arrived on the scene, but
recurring themes dominated his initial offering of songs, united by sound and
purpose, but often exploring a variety of themes. Dreamland, in contrast, is a
much more focused collection. The ten songs included on this release are tied
together by variations on a common theme. Hannah’s intention is to explore the
nature of our memories and these songs inhabit an indefinable land between the
consciousness and unconsciousness where the narratives of our lives can often
seem much different to us than they really are. The songs are largely acoustic,
but there are certainly a few moments on Dreamland where the guitars rise quite
assertively to the fore and a full band unleashes some rousing passages during
instrumental breaks.
The
title song opens Dreamland and lulls listeners into the album. Hannah
consistently strikes an ideal balance between his often exquisite acoustic
guitar work and dry, even distanced, voice, but there’s generous amount of
emotion, vulnerability chief among them, slipping in between the cracks in each
of Dreamland’s songs. He roughs things up some for “Broken Hearts & Broken
Bones” without ever giving the album an entirely different tenor so early on;
the arrangement blends the acoustic and electric elements of the track quite
effectively. Hannah, moreover, is accompanied by some top flight players on the
album. When they have a chance to indulge their talents some, none of them
overstep the song’s borders and keep things tasteful. “Set Free” plays a little
with the sort of clichés you often hear in songs like this, but you can have
different takes on that as a listener. In some ways, it makes sense that a song
about leaving things behind you is semi-crouched in familiar language or
imagery that makes sense to us universally. The electric guitar in this song
isn’t omnipresent in any way, but it does get to cut loose occasionally with
fantastic results.
“The
Night Is My Home” rates as the purest folk song on Dreamland. There’s a faint
melancholy edging in on this song Hannah wisely never pushes too hard and it
makes the imagery carry more of that message. The introduction of pedal steel
during the song’s second half underscores melancholy. “Different Kind of Light”
opens with a light keyboard swell before segueing into another fine slice of
Hannah’s acoustic guitar work. The intensity, however, rises another notch when
more instruments, particularly stinging electric guitar, enter the musical
picture. There’s a small battery of guitars employed to get over the album’s
penultimate track “Gone”, but it’s also one of the album’s breeziest
performances and has a loose-limbed, inspired blues feel that’s nearly
impossible to resist. The finale “Morning Song” returns us to Hannah’s comfort
zone with a suitably low-key acoustic ending. Dreamland benefits immensely from
its running order and, in particular, the first and final tracks help create
the unity defining the album as a whole. This is a great achievement for Matt
Hannah and opens further doors to his future.
9
out of 10 stars
Montey
Zike
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