We never seem to give enough credit to the keyboard players. They’re always there just on the sidelines, practically tucked away in the wings. Look at Pink Floyd’s Richard Wright, The Band’s Garth Hudson, or Jon Lord of Deep Purple. They’re probably the strangest and most intelligent members of the band and they get the least amount of glory. That is, until they’ve been given a moment to shine. Wintersleep’s keyboardist Jon Samuel just got his, with the release of Dead Melodies, a whole solo album dedicated to undervalued music and does it ever shine.
The irony of the Dead Melodies is that Samuel crafted the album as a lament for his previous release, and 2012 solo debut, First Transmission. The acoustic guitar-driven album featured the keyboardist stepping out as soft-spoken frontman à la Nick Drake. Sadly, First Transmission didn’t garner the reception that Samuel was hoping for, and with the tracks essentially orphaned from the cultural canon, he was struck with the concept for “Dead Melodies”; these under-valued pieces of art that had been left adrift in the ether. In the process, Samuel generated some genuine bangers, first and foremost of which is that titular track.
Of course, none of this happened in a vacuum either. Samuel has had the better part of a decade to hone his song-writing skills. He also enlisted the aid of his Wintersleep bandmates into process; with drummer Loel Campbell in the role of producer and Tim D’Eon on guitar. He’s also joined by Matt Mays on guitar, Chris Seligman of Star on French Horn and Walrus’s Keith Doiron on bass. You can’t say he’s skimped on the talent.
The album is filled with pensive introspection and well-considered speculation of the world at large, but combines Samuel’s skills as a DJ (yeah, he has those too) to palatably wrap everything up in something you can dance to.
The album immediately takes off with “Another Lie,” launching in with a minimalist beat that might have been lifted straight from the books of Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh and married to the raw jangled guitar of The Who’s “My Generation.” It’s catchy and fraught with social commentary.
“If people gave a fuck I think ‘Another Lie’ would be a controversial song,” laughs Samuel.
The song delves into the separation between convictions and action: that while the vast majority of people will decry inequity, those willing to commit to the sacrifices necessary to enact change are in the minority. Samuel recognizes that good people, himself included, are still inevitably willing to turn a blind eye to some levels of suffering if our own comfort is threatened.
The album seems, unsurprisingly, a series of songs where Samuel is letting us know just what’s getting under his skin. It is full of what seems like the nervous energy that’s left behind in the wake of a person after a breakup. There are a series of square pegs not finding their way into round holes; each problem is challenged with increasing languor and interspersed with fits of mania.
“Modern Lovers” gets to the crux of it, with Samuel opening up with a jaded stance following a failed long-term relationship that silently reverberates throughout the album with a beat that sounds akin to something from mid-2000s Radiohead.
The two worlds seem to collide on “Unlovable” where Samuel turns powerfully venomous. Without context it might come across as a diatribe from extremely bitter ex, or inwardly directed feelings of inadequacy. In either case it is potent; a cutting realization of unfulfilled potential. But Samuel says the bitter break-up song is definitely not his style.
“‘Unloveable’ isn’t about anyone else,” explains Samuel. “I hate lyrics like that actually. I don’t use my songs as a way to settle scores. I really don’t like break-up songs with that theme or thesis.”
That being said, “Sister Outside” takes a turn for the literal. Samuel describes the actual events of an evening when a friend was followed by a man into a Halifax bar, and the unsettling solidarity the situation had imposed as he walked her home. It is unabashedly frank in its immediacy. Samuel does not muck about in stating this is a reality in Halifax.
Dead Melodies offers plenty of insight into what’s been needling Jon Samuel. He has artfully blended the medium and his message. If you’re prepared to plumb its depth there’s the hard edge of a message to be discovered, but if you’re here to dance it’s easy to skate across the surface. Just don’t be shocked if you fall in.
“It’s gotta be both. Sound and meaning,” says Samuel. ‘I have no interest in totally vague lyrics that ‘sound good’.”