jamie mcpherson
Reviewed by: H.W. Bones
Published: 10 February 2011
lp: meeting place
First time I ran into Jamie McPherson was at a gig he was playing at Higher Ground on Light Square and I proceeded to talk at him for quite a while about the high ornamentation of the rosette on the feedback stopper of his twelve sting Takamine guitar. In addition he had on a Johnny Cash t-shirt which was instantly appealing. Nice chap, looked like he’d just come down from the mountains with his beat up hat on (which he effectively has, coming from Strathalbyn). What I saw on that day was an almost traditional folk performance, great and heart felt lyrics as much at home on stage as around a campfire.
It was with great interest I received Jamie’s debut album ‘Meeting Place’. Wonderfully packaged and looking slick as any major label release, with some great pictures of the artist lounging in various uncomfortable locales and a thought provoking painting by Jamie’s wife Tikarma taking up the back cover really rounding it out.
I popped ‘Meeting Place’ straight into the cosmic destruction player to see what Jamie had been cooking up in his home studio ‘Ravenwood’. As quickly as I put it in I took it out to make sure I hadn’t mixed it up with a new Leonard Cohen release, but no - definitely Jamie. The first track ‘Midsummer in a Summerland’ would not by any means be out of place on a newer era Cohen release, very clever lyrically and that same almost Casio drenched production on this, which is a nice easer into ‘Meeting Place’.
Throughout listening to this album I found myself more and more drawn into Jamie’s lyrics. He has a great eye for detail and even things that may be termed a cliché written by a lesser lyricist are dealt a deft and skilful hand on Jamie’s watch. In the tradition of many folk/country performers a wry and often dry humour surfaces in many of the songs which helps to lighten some of the lyrical load.
Jamie is not afraid to try his hand at various styles within the folk/country umbrella either, there are times where musically this release strays into almost doo wop territory along with a good sprinkling of rock and roll (that’s right - both kinds of music rock AND roll… Ba DAM Ching). The only cover on the album ‘No Expectations’ shows a further range of where Jamie is coming from in terms of influences.
If I could offer one piece of advice I’d love for Jamie to find his own voice a little more on his next release. I have had the pleasure of hearing Jamie play live and I can hear a lot of that voice in these recordings and it’s really a treat, but there are occasions where it does sound like his voice is borrowing from some of his heroes. This is something that is easy to do subconsciously whilst recording, but when you have got a voice with as much character and strength as Jamie’s I’d love to hear it push through stronger on the next one release that he puts out.
In all this is a great release, professionally packaged, raw and heart felt, and for this listener's ears, definitely autobiographical. I look forward to the next instalment!
