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Product Details
With the buzz of crickets, Great Lake Swimmers self-titled debut opens with the subtly intoxicating "Moving Pictures, Silent Films." Plucked acoustic guitar weaves with sparse piano while crickets whisper in the background and songwriter Tony Dekkers warbling voice hovers overtop; this could easily be the lonely soundtrack to a long-lost silent film. Recorded in an abandoned grain silo in southern Ontario, this haunting album finds its roots in classic folk music, and while mention of Nick Drake is undeniably loaded, its an unavoidable comparison. Throw in a pinch of Neil Youngs quieter moments and a touch of Cass McCombs and My Morning Jacket at their most sedate, and the result is the gorgeous sound of Great Lake Swimmers. With subtle colorings of acoustic guitar, piano, lap steel and accordion, its Toronto-based songwriter Dekkers voice that carries the band. The reverby echo of Dekkers vocals is the perfect accompaniment for a dark night on a moonlit porch or a long drive lit only by the dim glow of headlights. Addictive like the finest narcotics, this debut is an emotional, stirring album that is not just meant to be listened to&its meant to be soaked in.
Product Reviews
 (5 stars) - Unbelievable beauty...
I am originally from Southern Ontario. I put on this CD to remember my hometown, to feel that world again. Great Lake Swimmer's music is pure Canadiana. I can hear the crickets, I recall the humid summer nights, the smell of the grass and maple trees at dusk. When I hear the first track, "Moving Pictures, Silent Films" I think of my first love, the unrequited, mysterious pangs I felt in her presence.
There is desolation in this CD ("This is not like home"), melancholy ("The Man With No Skin") but also mysticism. "Faithful night, listening" ranks with the best of the German poet, Rainer Maria Rilke in terms of beauty and depth and "Merge, a vessel, a harbour" with the writings of Walt Whitman (I think of the poem "I sing the body electric") and Pablo Neruda's love poetry.
If you enjoy Iron & Wine, and Canadian musicians like Hayden and Neil Young (acoustic Young), then you'll enjoy this. This CD is indispensible. I feel in some small way it has had a great, silent impact on my life.
 (3 stars) - Music For the Comfort Zone.
The sun had already set on the Summer of Love when the apocryphally named,'America' wormed their anthemic mantra,'Horse With No Name' into popular consciousness. As banal as,'American Pie' but lacking pretentious obtuseness, we hummed along, similarily unfazed by its absurdities. This was surrealism without the joke. Which is what? An adolescent nursey rhyme looped in limbo. Which brings me to,Great Lake Swimmer's,'Bodies & Minds'. Dekker and his dudes look to be serious youg guys and they sound gorgeous. It's recorded in the suitable surrounds of an Ontarian Church. In fact the simplistic ambience of latterday Christianity is where the Decemberist's pitch is. For all the alleged Neil Young ancestry, their grittless lyrics bear about the same resemblance to their fellow Canadian as Kahil Gibran's spirituality does to the rhapsodic love poetry of Rumi. A matter of taste? What isn't. There will be plenty of advocates for these singalong pleasantries, just as several generations on, surrealist grunt and bite has devolved into prolific advertising kitsch. Singalongs are terrifically comforting and this is music for the comfort zone, at best a pale aphrodisiac. If only the Great Lake swimmers were joking.
(5 stars) - Where have these guys been hiding?
Or have I just been living in a bubble?
Great Lake Swimmers is one of the better bands I've heard in a long while. A refreshing deviation from the overhyped, mainstream offerings currently playing over the airwaves.
I agree with some that the songs are definitely not going to make you feel like all is sunny and sparkling in the world. They are, however, extremely beautiful and Tony Dekker's voice has a soothing quality about it that is very appealing.
I definitely hear some Neil Young influence. They also remind me a bit of South San Gabriel (specifically, Will Johnson).
If you like Iron & Wine (Sam Beam)or the artists referenced above, you'll likely enjoy this album.
(5 stars) - phenomenal first album
After having massively warped my copy of "Bodies & Minds," their newest release, from overuse in my car stereo, I recently caught a GLS show at a small local music café, where tragically there were less than 20 people in attendance, and where I was first introduced to the 10 ethereal, overpowering songs from this album, their first. Tony Dekker, finger-picking a very cello-sounding Seagull guitar, laid waste to the place. His vocals alone were enough to make you put off that bathroom break for painfully long stretches of time, striking a balance between the hushed intimacy of Sam Beam's whispered lullabies and the impressive range of Tim Buckley's operatic tenor. "Moving Pictures, Silent Films," a song in which the chord progression tumbles down the pentatonic scale in 3 sorrowful little movements, put more than a few lumps in the throats of those listening. And if "Merge, A Vessel" didn't leave the entire audience grief-stricken, "This is Not Like Home" left most digging in their pockets and purses for Kleenex, or choking down beer to regain composure. While I might be making their music sound like a trip to the funeral home, consider the monumental difficulty in creating something that has both the emotional and personal resonance as such a deathly event. Then consider whether or not it is time to stop ingesting sugar-coated, sunny pop numbers that deny a dismal reality for songs that look it square in the eye and embrace it.
(5 stars) - Sirens songs
A great album for days spent endlessly wondering if she'll ever come back to you - if things will ever be. But be careful, it must be followed by the likes of James Brown, Sugarman 3, disco or heartfelt rock cause only real funk can break the funk you may find yourself in after listening to this beautiful overlooked best album I've discovered this year.
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