Thursday, March 21, 2013

Hitting the Mark 2: Jim James

  You might know Jim James as the bearded poncho wearing front man of My Morning jacket, the psychedelic alt-country band hailing from Louisville, Kentucky. He has also worked with a few other bands including the awesome Monsters of Folk with Conor Oberst, M. Ward, and Mike Mogis. Last month he released his second solo album, Regions of Light and Sound of God.

   A lot of the tracks start sparsely with just James's voice and piano, or just guitar, but throughout the song more instrumentation is added until you find yourself awash in a soulful soundscape as in "State of the Art (AEIOU)" or in a marimba shaking, xylophone laden dance hall on "A New Life".

   The music video for "A New Life" is great. It depicts a spiritual journey full of dancing through doorways in the desert. The video begins with Jim James sitting alone in a dark room, playing his guitar and crooning softly. He gets up, walks through a door and ends up in the middle of nowhere. There's a woman with a bison's head standing in the middle of the road that stretches endlessly. She is dancing. More doorways appear, dancers appear. The world is alive, yet mysterious. Each doorway symbolizes the choices we make that holds uncertainty on the other side. But a series of these choices can lead you to where you want and need to be. You just need to keep moving.

Jim James
A New Life

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