Dan Smolla comes from Dekalb, Illinois. He's a patient and hard working guy who has multitracked his way to this, his third collection of songs - fifteen acoustic pieces with a lot more added layers than they really need.
The songs are OK – inoffensive and modest arrangements of normal chord patterns and melodic phrases with unobtrusive lyrics. His guitar playing is competent, his voice is a bit wobbly. The number of added audio tracks is definitely unusual. This reviewer finds them crowding and disconnected. (But for a different take by a reviewer with a better ear, try TP's review of the second album.)
With everything played by the artist in a sequence rather than by a band in real time there's little communicative flow, no recognisable texture or dynamic to justify the additional effort. The mix is bewilderingly undifferentiated and unfocussed. To listen I have to keep switching consciously from one track to another. Lots of vocals, several percussion sounds, two or three guitar parts and various wind instruments and keyboard parts are spread randomly around the stereo spectrum. Orchestrated is a word I could not use honestly.
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We are in the era of Joe Citizen as valid artist. And idiosyncracy is on a par with unique talent I guess. This guy's music is odd enough to be recognisably Don Smolla. I think if I heard a sixteenth Smolla track I'd know who it was. He could be part of the New Weird America Non Folk Movement I suppose. But in this instance the CD seems to have arrived at the wrong address and I can only tell you, dear reader, that multitracking can be a mixed blessing. Every small town has two or three Dan Smollas (except maybe Dekalb, Illinois). And they're all OK – but to reach a listener half way across the world the private enthusiast need to do something more special than be simply odd.
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