Damien Jurado: On My Way To Absence

Herald rating: * * *

The field of acoustic-based, introspective mope-pop with an alt.country sensibility is getting mighty crowded these days, but this entry from the Seattle-based Jurado is worth attention, if songs with titles Sucker, Night Out For The Downer, Icicle and A Jealous Heart Is A Heavy Heart appeal.

Jurado has a strong but restrained voice and prefers to hunch moodily over the mike to deliver melancholy songs which are alarmingly filled with references to guns, suicide, death, and mean-spirited jealousy coupled with vengeance: a simple hello would have been nice he says, menacingly, to a former lover.

But it's that sense of potential violence and recklessness ("I speed without caution on a road made of ice") which sets Jurado apart from the other melancholies: you get the impression he's fuming inside and at any moment his wrath will be unleashed, as it is on the swirling and apocalyptic I Am The Mountain which conjures up the spirit of angry Neil Young.

He doesn't believe in pulling punches either ("there's not a person I hate but you") which makes you think he's probably unlucky in love for a very good reason: "He doesn't know you like I do, I bring you treasure, a love you can measure."

Ladies might take fright, but that doesn't deny that these are powerful, stripped-down songs of nerve-end emotions and icy venom.

Label: Rhythmethod