The meaning of solo

Posted on | January 2, 2010 | Comments Off on The meaning of solo

Two of the most important albums in my library are Deb Talan’s Sincerely and Mike Doughty’s Skittish. These are each albums that I was listening to obsessively in 2007-2008 right Talan Sincerely and Doughty Skittish when I began to consider becoming a musician, and shortly after. No two works have had such an influence on me, and not only because of how they effected my taste for music and songwriting, but also because they taught me the incredible power of solo music.

And I need to be reminded of that power, because for most people, full bands will always have the upper hand. Our ears are just more attracted to rich, full-spectrum sound than the nasally whinings of some loudmouth malcontent like me. And that can be intimidating as a solo artist.

But it turns out that no other albums have had the deep EMOTIONAL power over me as these two. In fact, no album in my life has brought me to tears more than Sincerely. The stark emptiness of the sound created by a solo artists means that their voices, and their WORDS, rest in deep relief. What they say, and how they say it, becomes a part of the music, and in this way can connect with people in ways full bands simply cannot. The words and the meanings are lost in the sound.