No McShane, No Gain
Make listening to gifted songsmith Tom McShane your New Year’s resolution.
Colin Carberry, 06 Dec 2007
We expect lots to get lost in the post in the coming weeks. And for our heads to get turned by a blizzard of huckstering and snake-oil salesmanship.
So, before it all kicks off, while you’re all still bright eyed and eager of heart, let’s do some general house-keeping, and allow me to bring you up to speed with a few developments that may get passed over in the pre-Crimbo deluge.
Any excuse to big up Tom McShane (pictured) is welcome round these parts. We’ve been fans for many years of his low-lit and gently moving take on the teary-eyed Smog blueprint. Mainly because, where many who share his record collection sometimes tend towards minimalism and miserablism, Tom’s songs have always striven for scope and understanding. He’s released a number of EPs in the time since (following the demise of Ninebar International) he struck out on his own, and they’ve been full of wonderful, thoughtful, minor-key successes.
There’s a new one on its way early next year, but in the meantime, he’s decided to gather together a few of the best tracks from the early work and, in advance of a short West Coast tour in December, release them in the US. It’s a typically unassuming, but ambitious move on Tom’s part. And you’ll no doubt be glad to hear that it’s paid off royally.
Beautifully packaged and designed (with pics from our Ambers), Departures gives a gentle reminder of Tom’s ability to balance tender introspection with choruses that look sunnily outward. If it crosses your path, snap it up and hold it close to your breast.
Then we’ve got Canizares. Now don’t try to hide: I know there are lots of you out there trying to maintain a productive life while in the grip of a debilitating Pixies fixation. Well, I suggest you hook up with this lot. Judging by the ten tracks on their debut album, Is This My Stop, this trio seem perfectly qualified to set up a support group. They bound through these tunes in a flurry of vertiginous guitars and yelped vocals, and while it struggles in places to find an individual personality – too often lapsing into the generic and poorly realised – the likes of ‘On The Beach’ show that there’s potential there to work with. And, judging by the likeably hic-cuppy ‘Forever Young’, a fair bit of off-beam personality too.
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