I Draw Slow - Downside
I Draw Slow are an Irish five piece pedalling Irish-Americana folk roots old timey like a gimlet-eyed carpetbagger will sell you an elixir for beauty, another for snake bites and in the saloon later — will swagger away with your maidenhead.
‘Course Daddy won’t talk to ye now and it’s probably only ’til the thaw ‘fore he throws you out and it’s the brothel for you — what with you not finishin’ your schoolin’ and that limp…’course what man would want you on accounts of yer droopy eye…
Their claw hammer banjo player tells me each album is like a storybook, each song telling its own story. Where not traditional arranged, the lyrics are often exquisite rolling and unfolding things of melody and thought.
It’s good daydreaming music - a nice soundtrack to writing or whatever else you’re doing. You may even suddenly find yourself swaying in an apron with cloth wrapped freshly baked bread wondering if that rabbit has hung long enough…
‘Little Switzerland’ - the album opener - reminds me of Heaven’s Gate or another similar western and sets the scene in my imagination. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be gritty, a feller or two may get shot and there may well be a squabble over land, whores perhaps even opium.
‘Lighthouse Daughter’, follows with a slight ‘Thousands are sailing’ Planxty vague hint. A story in its own right, I’m off having the scene set for the other lead character. In a segue - a man has just been shot dead on a fancy mattress with a Derringer - the camera mingles the spread of his blood with images of the coast.
‘Bowling Green’ has the jaunt of a travelling montage perhaps to the town where she grew up - it meddles with the flashback of a teenage marriage to the man that might well become that gunfighter prospector preacher railroad feller. There’s sepia infidelities and bright happiness.
‘Halfway cuts’ away back from the city to the towns, maybe to the youngest or eldest sister. A mismatched bar fight and a wooing. A man gets beaten half to death and there’s a miscarriage.
‘Santiago’ stumbles drunken through the saloon doors, frowning as it tries to focus on its pocket watch. He needs help getting his boots off — their laughter acts as a counterpoint.
‘Sisken song’ - The story in my head abruptly stops at the lyric “I heard a bird singing in a tree - his dead brown eyes a’followin’ me” I’m left in the horrors thinking about birds and their dead brown eyes. I have to walk through a leafy part of the city later and I’m going to have to take my long coat - the one I can pull the collar up on. Damn birds - damn birds and their cold dead brown eyes always looking at me.
‘Low High Low’ - the story has entered an exercise in speed editing - as the ladies argue sense and sensibility, the hooker with the heart of gold, the virgin bride and the practical knife hiding middle child who always wipes and washes short after by the porcelain bowl. He may mention how he always hates it how she gets up right after, but she may amble off on some oblique story about her daddy and cleanliness and the soul. It trails away with a blossom laden mountain wedding and an ominous darkening of the sky.
‘Oh Sally’ brings me roaring back to Heaven’s Gate. A rousing track of love and jealousy, of drunkenness and lies. We cut from lush scenes of community, colour and love to moments of abrupt jarring violence. She just caved that man’s skull in with a horseshoe, the knife slips accidentally deep and he just blew that man into the creek. In between we are always cutting back to the train coming through the snowy mountains.
‘Little Satchel’ a wonderful instrumental breaks up the run to the last two tracks - the new comer smokes aromatic tobacco, you can tell in the silence, the reactions, the faces.
‘That Boy’s Not Fair’ - starts with a fight, she gets a good few slaps in before he has her wrists - he goes down with a shocked look, head trying to crane down to the hole in his chest. And we’re back to the brothel, he looks hurt and she’s running her mouth - his hand raises but not faster than the Derringer she has in her garter. After the house is ransacked, we pan sideways to the reflection in the window as they drag her towards the railroad tracks.
‘Dead In The Morning’ - back once again to the brothel, the three of them have met as the remaining sisters share a drink and a cry. The other other middle one seems intent on leaving with her youngins and man saying something about P’aw and Mexico. We finally hear the man with the aromatic tobacco speak and we’re still unsure whether he’s the past teenage husband - a brother or adopted. It doesn’t matter, he’ll most likely be dead in the morning. It’s snowing outside and we can clearly see this in the reflected light as the saloon doors are opened…
This has nothing much to do with the lyrics and the stories they tell.
This is just where the album takes me.
That is has enough power to take me away to somewhere as detailed, perhaps as beautiful - is enough of a testament to the power of this band.
While I’m here - they have this video - for this song that wasn’t on the album I just bamboozled. It’s on the next one. It was filmed live, in a forest - it’s utterly splendid - have a look, a listen.
Note
I Draw Slow are a small independent outfit. If you like this music buy it.
Here’s the video to their single ‘Goldmine’
Originally published at 20/08/2011
