Daniel Lanois
Shine

Every time a producer releases a new album under their own name, I'm perplexed: it's a bit like a literary critic writing a novel, or an art critic exhibiting their never-before-seen artworks...

I might be impulsive, I might be an odd case, but when someone tells me I could have done better by following their advice, or when someone criticizes me after the work is completed, I always end up questioning who my interlocutor is, what they have achieved personally, and in many cases, I choose to make mistakes, if I must, with my own mind and not someone else's.

For a producer to be impactful, I think they should have already proven themselves as a composer, as a musician, and in their own name, to earn the right "in the field" to say and do what they do. Of course, artists, even the greatest ones, are free to give carte blanche to whomever they please, even a deaf person if they choose to.

So who is this Daniel Lanois, Canadian born in 1951, co-producer of U2's youth albums alongside Brian Eno, collaborator with the former Roxy Music in his solo works, producer of what might have been Dylan's best recent albums, and even producer of Emmylou Harris... Who is he, I mean, as an artist, who is he in his own name? That he has credit (and is good) is undeniable, but in his own name what has he been and is he capable of doing?

"Shine" is dated 2003, marking the personal return of the Canadian after a decade without solo works, except for a couple of O.S.T. if I remember correctly. He's essentially a country man like almost all Canadians, a lover of pedal steel, someone who, when he picks up a guitar, instinctively brings out the basic tricks of country guitar lessons. And on these loops, he builds an album that is largely cool country, subdued, tamed, and restrained; played with refinement, intentionally sparse, and in the closing "JJ Leaves L.A." even instrumental.

Back to Brian Eno in instrumentals like "Transmitter" and "Space Kay" (Mars's soil is roughly the color of the American desert). The whole thing is very appealing, very much a "show of skill"; it has a languid rhythm like an "exhibition" tennis match, and it is devoid of soul. Fortunately, the salvageable is saved at the top and bottom of the tracklist, where Lanois chooses to make music that remains very refined, but within the confines of pop-rock. At the top, the melancholies of the weary U2 of "Trying To Throw Your Arms Around The World" and "Stay" echo in the opening "I Love You", and the Dubliners triumph absolutely with "Falling At Your Feet", co-written and co-sung with Bono Vox and already issued in a U2 work, namely the O.S.T. of "Million Dollar Hotel."

At the bottom, we find the commendable winter guitar soul of "Slow Giving", the root rock that's only a shell in "Fire", and the reminiscence/potential blues rock 1969 of "Power Of One."

Great display of skill, and great self-satisfaction; great class and great detachment. Like all other "real" producers, producers "and nothing more." But after ten years of absence, any return is always a worthwhile return.