Tracks
Benjamin Wetherill: "Orange & Silver"
(2005)
By Dom Sinacola | 14 January 2008
Wetherill’s made this easy…; re: he’s from Leeds, sharing simple, obtuse lyrics sopping in morose affection with new sad-sack favorite David Thomas Broughton; see: Peril Hill and other Singing Knives artists in nearby Sheffield, catering to a basic chamber-folk formula and refreshing it with sawdust and a heavy conscience; c.o.: Nick Drake, circa Five Leaves Left, is the patron saint of this entrenched British crew, hanging like the limbo-ed spectre he is over the disadvantages of youth. Where there isn’t age, the ghost justifies an inexplicable husk in the singers’ voice. Where there isn’t experience, where there isn’t, truly, a stock of broken lovers, Benjamin Wetherill blows into his recorder and lifts them, uncoiling, from his wicker basket.
…Easy to feel, easy to describe, easy to scoff at, easy to not believe. Then there’s Wetherill’s image, a dapper, if stilted, early century getup, complete with ukulele and anachronistic romance a la George Formby. His presence, babyfaced and sepia, is unnerving, as if to imply that, yes, there were better times before these. Much better. And it takes someone who has never experienced those times to make this apparent. In any case, “Orange & Silver” promotes the accessibility of Wetherill’s talent without becoming busy or too solipsistic. Fran Rodgers’s gorgeous vocal accompaniment is threaded between Wetherill’s stippled guitar, as is a demure tone from the recorder, the lulling acoustic arpeggio only challenged by a rising, multi-tracked moaning from Ben. And maybe this arrangement is borderline mundane, the sentiments a thin tripe broth for those cynically inclined, but Wetherill and his ilk earn their subtlety—they’re so fucking concise at hitting the right beat, striking the right nuance, and stepping back—and carry their genre with devotion. It’s not a matter of limiting the scope of the songwriting, it’s a matter of
weight. Years and legends are hard to carry with sartorial grace.
…Easy to feel, easy to describe, easy to scoff at, easy to not believe. Then there’s Wetherill’s image, a dapper, if stilted, early century getup, complete with ukulele and anachronistic romance a la George Formby. His presence, babyfaced and sepia, is unnerving, as if to imply that, yes, there were better times before these. Much better. And it takes someone who has never experienced those times to make this apparent. In any case, “Orange & Silver” promotes the accessibility of Wetherill’s talent without becoming busy or too solipsistic. Fran Rodgers’s gorgeous vocal accompaniment is threaded between Wetherill’s stippled guitar, as is a demure tone from the recorder, the lulling acoustic arpeggio only challenged by a rising, multi-tracked moaning from Ben. And maybe this arrangement is borderline mundane, the sentiments a thin tripe broth for those cynically inclined, but Wetherill and his ilk earn their subtlety—they’re so fucking concise at hitting the right beat, striking the right nuance, and stepping back—and carry their genre with devotion. It’s not a matter of limiting the scope of the songwriting, it’s a matter of
weight. Years and legends are hard to carry with sartorial grace.