DAMIEN JURADO
Caught in the Trees
(Secretly Canadian)
By Todd Lavoie
If Damien Jurado ever decided to take a break from music and funnel his creative juices elsewhere – not that I’m encouraging him to – I reckon fiction-writing would be his new calling. The Seattle singer-songwriter has long been a recipient of Raymond Carver comparisons, having built a decade-plus career upon crafting taut, literate tales of quiet alienation and shattering despair that share the same spirit with that of the piercing-stared short-story master.
Having largely foregone the confessional fess-ups of, say, Elliott Smith, Cat Power, or Mark Kozelek, Jurado’s indie folk-rock (and occasionally just full-on, unhyphenated rock) tends to stick with character studies and immersions into the emotional lives of others rather than directing the pen towards the ins and outs of his own heart. Or, so I have gleaned from reading interviews with the man, anyway – ultimately, whatever ratio of storytelling-vs.-autobiography offered up in an artist’s body of work is known to him and him only. In any case, these portraits-in-miniature have not only made for gripping listening over the years – credit duly given to Jurado’s wounded, earhole-snuggling hushes – but they’ve given a solid argument for daydreaming about the possibilities of a literary career for the singer.
Jurado’s latest, Caught in the Trees, probably won’t shoo away any such reveries, either – the disc continues what is now a longstanding tradition of engrossing first-person-narrated fiction set to equally absorbing melodies. According to the press kit, it also took longer to make than any other in his catalog – one that is now nearly double-digits-deep with releases. Whether this was due to outside circumstances or the nature of the songs contained within, I am not sure, but the album does offer plenty of that trademark Jurado intensity.