New Bird Rise is the self-released CD debut by Dolph Chaney. Writing all the material, playing nearly all the instruments (voice, guitars, Moog, bass, piano, and percussion), and producing the recording, Dolph has applied the knowledge that comes from over a decade of experimentation at home with tape decks. At age 25, he’s already got a backlog of several hundred songs and around 20 full-length cassettes of recorded material. He’s had quiet but certain success onstage in various cities, and he’s gotten the occasional bit of attention from the press, TV, and the Internet. However, New Bird Rise constitutes a major leap forward on many fronts.
For one thing, it opens up a previously unexplored set of possibilities to Dolph’s music. Previous recordings were generally done on 2-track or 4-track cassette machines, and nearly always with voice and guitar, occasionally adding some Moog or drum machine. New Bird Rise was all recorded digitally, onto a PC, with as many as 64 tracks available. It also marks the first appearance of a drummer on a major Dolph project – Tanner Dorheim, veteran of Atlanta bands Dropsonic and The Mighty Afros. Tanner’s ingenuity and perspective during rehearsals and recording sessions helped steer Dolph’s material in new ways.
The aforementioned changes, however, were simply the next natural step in a process which started in 1993 with Dolph’s first solo 4-track recording, Ripples, and continued with the following year’s Infinity Dogs. The latter was Dolph’s first venture out of home recording, having been recorded live to DAT at the Houston studios of KTRU-FM by Justin Crane. And while the leap of sound quality was obvious, a more telling leap forward was to be found in the quality of the songwriting, the depth of the lyrical content and the sturdiness of the music.
The same can definitely be said of the progression between Infinity Dogs and New Bird Rise. Once more, Dolph has relied on the abilities of a very small team to create a recording of uncluttered, communicative beauty. The songs themselves were demoed by Dolph at home throughout 1997, and reviews of these demos illustrate clearly that these songs are ready for prime time. With New Bird Rise, he feels that he’s finally given them the attention necessary to bring his passionate, clever pop songs and his more experimental impulses together into one variety-packed but cohesive statement.
REVIEWS OF THE HOME DEMOS FOR NEW BIRD RISE
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* DEMO UNIVERSE: 2/18/98 feature, review by Jim Santo * Chaney's very amusing bio and a 1988 endorsement by Eugene Chadbourne as proof that "musical insanity is alive and well" led me to expect something rather more wacky than New Bird actually is. In fact, with the exception of "Ocean," a brief and peculiar ode to a brand of saltwater nasal spray, Chaney comes off as a tender, compassionate, erudite songsmith, with a wry sense of humor that deflates any encroaching sappiness. Affairs of the heart are a primary concern, but the spirit gets its due in several songs that exult Chaney's faith and love of God with uncommon subtlety. By emphasizing his personal relationship with the Almighty and eschewing proselytizing, he's a more successful missionary than more overtly "Christian" artists I've encountered. |
* RAGING SMOLDER MUSIC REVIEW: issue #11, review by Riff Gibson * Dolph Chaney, singer/songwriter, sashays thru pleasant acoustic-guitar (and sometimes a hint of synth) accompanied soft pop tones, poetical excursions supported by subtle supple melodies. Intriguing. Bittersweet romance, lost love, and more expressed elegantly in capable verse: "I held your present in the past, and I would like to take it back. I know, before this line is cast, your baited breath is what I lack" (from "Out of the Picture"); "I throw a rock at your head, but I miss you" (from "Miss You"); "And your smile in the fog just fades in a half-decade's serenades, like the moment I lost sight of you through the windshield" (from "New Years"); and "Lie to me, and let me lie with you. I'm tired of the truth; I just want you" (from "Let Me Lie"). |
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* 100% INDEPENDENT: Feb-Mar 1998, uncredited review * Rating: 7 Who's that smiling, cherubic figure looking back at me off the inside cover of this 13-song cassette? Why its Dolph Chaney, looking smug and pleased after the release of his latest tape, New Bird. And he has good reason to smile. This is a pretty nice piece of work. In hugely contradictory fashion, Dolph plays low-fi home taped Christian pop. Don't let that C-word scare you off though, as Dolph proves that punkers don't have the corner on this particular market. Most of this is pretty lite sounding musically, but the saving grace is Dolph's knack for writing a memorable melody. Songs like the opener "New Years"," Miss You", and "Autumn Leaves" are lovely and delicate, and stand up really well. He turns up the volume a bit on "My Crucifixion", and that actually works pretty well too. Not surprisingly, the production is a little muddy here, and there's only percussion on a few cuts. Still, a little songwriting talent can go a long way, and, if he plays his cards right, Dolph could go along way in Christian music circles too.. |
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