Folk singers need something to sing about, so it’s fitting that Edmonton, Canada’s Buckman Coe has pursued several interests besides music in his young life. He’s studied sociology, psychology, and ecology in school, as well as delving deeply into yoga and its teachings. While his 2010 album Latest Waking doesn’t address any of these topics directly, you can definitely sense undercurrents of his many pursuits. His lyrics show a keen understanding of human emotion; a concern for the Earth, and his music reflects a Zen-like calm and inner peace. Recorded mostly in his apartment, Latest Waking displays a mastery of home-recording technology. The average listener would never guess this album wasn’t produced in a lavish studio with a small army of backing musicians and singers.
As a songwriter, Coe favors bright, shimmering melodies in the style of Paul Simon or his fellow Canadian, Neil Young, played with trebly conviction on acoustic guitar. The most distinctive feature is his voice is a gossamer falsetto that recalls the grace and elegance of the late Jeff Buckley. His lyrics eschew the simplistic rhyming couplets of much folk music for intricate and sometimes subversive passages that go much deeper than the easy-listening veneer of his melodies.
“Give Up The Fright,” the album’s opening track, offers a prime example of Coe’s wry lyrical machinations. At first listen, the album’s romantic arrangement of finger picked acoustic guitar, deeply resonant violin, and drum loop, along Coe’s sexy come-hither vocal, gives the impression that this is a simple love song. But when Coe sings, “how I wish I could tie you down,” is he only talking about emotional commitment? The verse continues, “Oh girl, with your kinks like mine, surely that is hard to find.” It’s a subtle, playful double-entendre, but it adds an edge you don’t expect from such a pretty Lite-FM melody.
Coe’s interest in psychology comes into play on “Lift Yourself Up.” With a sparse arrangement of plucked acoustic guitar, a hint of glockenspiel, a whisper of percussion, and his sweet falsetto vocal, he sings of how “everybody’s got their sob story down,” and how depression is as easy to find as “the craters on the moon.” The song becomes an entreaty to look around and enjoy what we have; “it may come as a surprise that you’re doing really fine.” The song works like an entire self-help volume delivered in four and a half minutes of pleasant listening. “And Love Again” tells the story of someone who’s ready to open his heart again after the death of a loved one, a very common experience that many listeners will relate to. Again, Coe uses the sweet, sad sound of violin as a counterpart to his yearning vocal as he professes, “I’m ready to live and love again.”
In New York, there was a radio station that used to advertise “love songs, nothing but love songs.” Their programmers would have embraced “Mistakes And Victories,” a six and a half minute symphony of devotion, as Coe combines universal feelings of desire with specific memories of an unforgettable first date. A first kiss, the sound of the ocean, a heart beating so hard that ribs ache are the details that Coe uses to bring these memories to life. But Coe also has a vivid imagination, as displayed on “Flee With Me,” which conjures the images of a nuclear apocalypse (“the buildings collapsed with a horrifying sound, we crawled through the rubble when the heat died down”) as a metaphor for an undying love that can survive anything. The ashen faces of fellow survivors flash past as Coe and his lover seek a place to wait until the sun breaks through the post-nuclear winter and “we’ll plant our fields and sing under the stars at last.” Many songwriters would use some sort of sci-fi synthesizer effects or a harder rock edge on a lyric like this, but Coe sticks to his dreamy falsetto and folk-pop instrumentation, which juxtaposes brilliantly against the stark lyric.
“Disappear Into Love” serves up a musical change of pace as Coe switches into jam band mode, adding a funky bass part and up tempo melody. The lyrics are playful, and the mood is upbeat until Coe brings it all together in a bluesy, expansive bridge. Dave Matthews fans, take note: this one’s for you. A slinky, bluesy, minor key melody adds an ominous note on “Off The Beaten Path,” an ecological parable. While the song’s message is ultimately optimistic, there’s a palpable sense of dread communicated in both the music and vocal that runs through this song, as big oil and bulldozers encroach on our environment.
It seems a forgone conclusion that women will make you crazy, but “Crazy-Making Woman” drives that point home as Coe sings of a seductress who bewitches and bedazzles him, to the point where “I stopped drinking, it was too much to feel.” There’s a bit of Bob Marley in the lilting bridge, but what stands out here is when Coe brings everything together with the arresting hook, “I’ve been searching for trouble all these days, and lo, she wants love,” delivered in a waltz tempo. It’s the single best line of the entire album, one of those moments that stick in your heard until you can’t wait to hear it again.
Coe gets funky and soulful on “Jokers Always Crush,” which adds distortion to the vocal to emphasize the silky, sultry R&B feel of the track. Electric guitars and bass and a chorus of background singers add to the cocktail lounge vibe. It’s a real change from most of the album and really lets Coe show off his range. Pealing pedal steel adds a country feel to “Soldier,” which ends the album with a plea for peace and tranquility. This is the Buckman Coe who practices yoga and seeks spiritual bliss. Both in the sweeping orchestral melody and the sound of flowing water that ends the track, there’s an organic richness here. “No man is forsaken on either side,” Coe tells us. “It is all life.”
Latest Waking touches on many human emotions; the songs can be sexy or spiritual, playful or earnest, funky or peaceful. Buckman Coe’s soulful vocals and elegant falsetto make him a singer to be reckoned with. From the depth and variety of this album, one feels he could hold his own in a coffeehouse or a jazz lounge, a honky tonk or a church.
Reviewed by Jim Testa
Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)
