Dan Griffin’s music is good for your heartbroken travelling soul. If you are a fan of Hayden‘s haunting piano, Neil Young‘s delayed and dirty hooks and Springsteen‘s working man melodies, then you will love Dan’s latest EP Bordertown. It’s a perfect follow up to his 2011 release Leave Your Love. This simple 5 track EP with all its intros and outros, is beautifully produced to blend together as a 1 – 15 min long cohesive song – and it feels that way.
“I don’t usually plan the theme of an album in advance of writing the songs – usually I try to find a common thread after the fact. After I had recorded a bunch of songs, I found that these ones fit together well and told a story about my transition to Windsor. I like when albums are narrative and focused like short films.”
The title track is a movie waiting to happen. It sums up everything about living so close to our neighbouring southern superpower. The small town steel mill burned-out automotive disaster imagery is very present throughout. Reinforced its brilliant video, Bordertown quietly screams everything that is good in rock n roll up to this point in music.
Although the EP is called Bordertown I can’t stop listening to The Hum. Filled with Van Halen keys and Don Henly’s Boys of Summer‘s driving drum fills takes me right back to early morning breakfast listening to FM radio hits before school. Dan’s discovered a relevant link between his past and present. His Kaynesgue vocal solo in Follow Me is unstoppable. Groovy bass runs, and his atmospheric melodies are just waiting for Feist to cover one day.
In case you didn’t know, Dan used to play keyboards and produced/co-wrote with the Arkell‘s and as much as I love their hometown sound I’m SOOO glad he went solo. No offence.
“For me, it’s never been about going solo – it’s just about personal growth and finding balance in whatever you do. I’m really proud of the Arkells and what we accomplished together. When I made the decision to go back to school, none of us were really sure how it would change things but we knew it was important to adapt and be supportive of each other.”
Do yourself a much needed musical favour and go see Dan’s Toronto EP release party Nov 1st @ the Legendary Horseshoe Tavern (tickets), pick up his music on iTunes and make sure you check out dangriffin.ca for show updates and links.
I’m giving this a 4 out of 5 EARS but only because I wanted to hear more songs.