1/26/2011 Picks of the Past: Lovers

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Picks of the Past: Lovers

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Jesse Flavin, Daniel Rickard, Brent Jones and

Carolyn Berk. (photo: Knut Hybinette)

“Carolyn Berk sees dead people. Or so one would think, after listening to any of the songs by her
band, Lovers.”

That’s the sort of glib, clever opening line a typical music critic might employ in a review of a Lovers
album. Not that I have anything in particular against music critics – hell, at least they get paid to
come up with glib lines. But The Gutter and the Garden, a new album by Lovers that I was fortunate
enough to preview, is a different animal; it’s just0above that.

That’s because this is the most moving and inspirational album I have heard all year.

Moving? Clearly. Inspirational? Well, not in the sense that I want to emulate the personal travails and
traumas Ms Berk writes about in her songs. What I actually wish to emulate is Ms Berk’s skill as a
writer.

Which brings us back around to the aforementioned dead people. The album is positively chock-a-
block with them. Your love is lik e a vulture, it feeds off what is dead, writes Berk in “the first law of
thermodynamics” (the track listing I was provided has everything in lower case, and I'm not about to
second-guess them). Later in the same track, she writes, I’ve not forgotten what I said, come and find
me when you’re dead / My heart is haunted. In the song “your handwriting (a porch song)”, Berk refers
to an emotional landscape where we live lik e full-grown ghosts of twelve-year-olds. And I haven’t even
mentioned the song “the air you breathe is full of ghosts”.

The lyrics are written largely in clever couplets with whimsical imagery, and feature subject matter that
ranges from sentimental musings to dour laments. Yet it somehow never comes across as maudlin.
Indeed, it takes considerable skill to tread such lyrically well-traveled ground without sounding clichéd,
to give universal themes a breath of fresh air, even if that air is cold.

Of course, if good lyrics are not backed up by musical arrangements that are equal to the task, then
all you have is a spoken-word album; or worse – folk music. Fortunately, it’s the music of Lovers that
seals the deal, the propulsion that drives the lyrics into your heart. On Lovers' debut album,
Starlit Sunk en Ship, Carolyn Berk was backed primarily by slide-guitarist Daniel Rickard and
apparently-able-to-play-every-instrument Brent Jones, and aided by a bevy of session musicians who
orchestrated her original acoustic melodies into something grander and richer. On The Gutter and the
Garden, piano, percussion and violin add much to the mood, and a little goes quite a long way.

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1/26/2011 Picks of the Past: Lovers
And I'd like to say that even the very name of the band is simple, evocative and perfect. Not a small
detail, when you want people to notice, enjoy, and hopefully buy your music.

Carolyn Berk has expressed in interviews that she’s actually a happy person, and that although her
lyrics are influenced by personal experiences, the music of Lovers is nonetheless calculated to be this
dark. Yet I repeat that it made me feel inspired rather than depressed. Maybe it’s because I lik e “sad
music” (and therefore, paradoxically, it makes me happy) that I felt somehow uplifted after listening to
The Gutter and the Garden. Or maybe it’s just because it’s always satisfying to be the beneficiary of
good writing – no matter what the genre.

Carolyn Berk plans on self-releasing The Gutter and the Garden shortly, followed by a tour of the US and England. In the
meantime, you can purchase the debut Lovers album, Starlit Sunken Ship, at http://www.orangetwin.com/lovers.html.

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