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Rating: At the Hunterian Museum (35-43 Lincoln's Inn Fields) the skeleton of an Irish Giant is displayed, who, having lived his entire life as a freak in circuses, requested to be burned and scattered in the sea so that his body would not meet the same fate. Evidently, no one cared at the time, and now at the Hunterian Museum, he looks down at me as if he wants to vent his anger. His name seems to have been Kevin, like the ghost that a certain Dan Gray auctioned on eBay for a dollar and 24 (and if you throw it into the sea, you don't even have to burn it): Dan complained that the girl no longer undressed and decided to get rid of the friend, who is also portrayed in a photo but you can only see the Nikes.
"It's getting dark, and I have a ghost walking me home" sings Nick Talbot in "The Diver" and perhaps this is not exactly what Dan meant but "Flashlight Seasons" would be my album of the year if it weren't for a few months early: it's sadder than anything else playing in my reader and stronger than hordes of heroes that came back to warm my heart when I had turned my back. "Flashlight Seasons" is a collection (of songs?) from the darker side of life recorded with a purity of sound, voice, and lyricism that takes your breath away. A marriage between folk and ambient that uplifts the spirit, a sequence of stories of harrowing pain that amaze with the simplicity with which they were conceived. And who knows what it might mean when you realize that the years pass and the music gets darker - you should worry, but instead, you keep getting older.
In "Hopechapel Hill" it represents the peak: it is here that all the voices and faces that have accompanied you along the slopes gather every night, and there they remember you while you finish another beer and dedicate it to them, and the world seems better to you. And who doesn't have an invisible friend - one who comes to visit you at night and tells you how powerful his drug is? I want mine to be the Irish giant, and since I got to know him, he often comes to find me and tells me how powerful his drug is while he looks down on me. With him, I can even imagine fate, the sea, hills of hope, circuses from all over the world, and Dan Gray's girlfriend.
Nothing new - I tell her - while she insists on undressing.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
04 Bluebeard (04:26)
you stood for all that's true and honest it makes you feel hollow you can't decide which path to follow you dig your own hole are you coming out tonight? we're going for a drive the answer's in your eyes the voice inside your head says stay at home and stare at the demons that thrive inside a tale left half told wouldn't you love to know how the person inside survives is it any wonder you get sucked under and you can't rely on those you turn to they turn against you you don't know why you whored those values which burn your soul blue
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Other reviews
By koopa
"Flashlight Seasons is a beautiful predominantly acoustic music album, built on unintrusive arpeggios and shy vocal/melodic lines that have a great emotional impact."
"Songs to listen to again and again: 'Fog Around the Figurehead' - how to feel romantically dreamy without wallowing in self-pity like high school sophomores."
