Darden Smith – Deep Fantastic Blue
Austin singer-songwriter Darden Smith may be best-known for joining forces with Boo Hewerdine (leader of English band The Bible) to form an oddly successful transatlantic Americana act: the Hewerdine/Smith album Evidence is a minor classic (recently reincarnated by Nashville indie Compass). That disc and Smith’s solo records are loaded with killer melodies, initially unassuming songs that relentlessly insert themselves in your forebrain. Deep Fantastic Blue isn’t Smith’s best record, but it’s another solid effort in his remarkably consistent career.
Musically, things are kept simple. Smith plays acoustic guitar and is backed by an electric guitar or two, bass, and drums, with very slight touches of keyboards on occasion. Most everything is medium tempo and medium loud. The low-key approach works best on the first song, with a warm guitar slide punctuating Smith’s soulful sigh: “Heaven must have felt like this the first day of the sun.”
Deep Fantastic Blue is subtle; a first listen is unlikely to snare any listener not familiar with Smith’s history. Three or four spins later, though, even skeptics will be hard-pressed to avoid singing the choruses of “First Day of the Sun” and “Running Kind”. On the down side, there’s a moment in the beginning of “Chariots” that sounds like a George Michael comeback. And there are a few clunky lines: “You know I always played the romance game/Two parts sex, one part avoiding the blame.” But the first four tracks of Deep Fantastic Blue shine like sunny days in a Seattle winter.