There can't be too many drum and voice albums out there but this idiosyncratic album belongs to this small but select genre.
Neal Morgan was born in Nevada, Califonia but now lives in Portland, Oregon. This is the follow up to his debut LP To The Breathing World in 2009 - both albums are self released but distributed by Drag City records.
Morgan is no slouch behind the drum kit as can be gleaned from the fact that he is one of Joanna Newsom's Ys Street Band and has toured with Bill Callahan since 2009. Having sat behind such skilled wordsmiths you can imagine him thinking to himself: "I could do that".
His own words rely less on poetry or complex wordplay and more on setting down moments from his life in the same way that you might pick out random entries from a diary.
He speaks rather than sings, with a voice which is mostly soft and calm, more akin to the intimacy of Sufjan Stevens than the flinty baritone of Bill Callahan.
On around half the tracks, the minimalist backing is confined to what he calls "free impulse drumming" together with wordless layers of polyphonic vocal configurations which lend the tracks a curious faux-baroque quality.
You get the impression that there is something cathartic about the way Morgan chooses to share his thoughts, drawing a freedom from the self imposed limitations of the song structures.
I think he would relate to the opening lines to William Henry Davies poem, Leisure, which poses the rhetorical question : "What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare".
Ostensibly, the details of Morgan's life are relatively mundane. He describes swimming, wandering, driving, standing and dreaming but in the course of these activities he allows himself time to stand and stare; to reflect and wonder.
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The standout track, Fathers Day, is a good example. He drives into town but has no particular place to go - "I got out, started walking around" he says before pausing to observe "the Californian light is really something this time of year".
Similarly, in Kicking The Ball - a drum-less track - he ends the piece about killing time alone reflecting "it's pride that makes a man" and repeats the line four times as though to seal it in his mind.
The percussive pulse gives a nervous energy to proceedings but Morgan appears to have found a measure of tranquillity so that on the title track he makes a note to self : "I'm finally where I want to be".
These are personal and occasionally hippy-dippy reflections to fleeting time and what he calls the "fluorescent magic of life and love" (Wandering The Block).
It would be all too easy to write-off Morgan as a self indulgent novelty act but this is a record that demands and rewards patience.
Its strength derives from the artist's willingness to lay himself open to ridicule. If I were a facilitator of a self-help group with him as a member I would say: 'thanks for sharing'.
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