Album Notes

Funny thing about Seattle resident Michael Vermillion… nobody would expect the bass player of the defunct, explosive (I will be using the word “rock” instead of the dreaded word “emo”) band Vendetta Red to turn around and become a country and blues-influenced singer/songwriter with ditties that ranged from disturbingly dark to gloriously uplifting (but all of ‘em real purty).

Most recently, he’s been driven to release a full album of urgent, delicately produced songs aptly titled Last Night on Earth. And while he’s done it without the help of an established label (the album is out on his own Astrolabe Records), he had the help of plenty of friends and fellow musicians.

Another funny thing about Michael Vermillion… he’s up in a Pacific Northwest metropolis, spitting out songs that, daresay, sound like they were written on the porch of a Sonoran desert hideaway or in the scraggly backyard of a Barrio Viejo row house.

That’s right, he sounds way more like what you would expect from a Tucson singer/songwriter than a Seattle rock musician with European tours under his belt. Now clearly, that’s a bit of a stereotype, but maybe it has something to do with songs that inspire music videos in your mind that take place in locales such as abandoned, dusty buildings, rusty train yards, lonely desert landscapes, all under a scorching sun. “I love music that sounds like it came from the desert, or a dark dank alleyway, or a lonesome road, or even solitude.”

The dusty sound may also have to do with the instrumentation added to each song. From banjo, pedal steel, slide guitar to lilting female backup vocals, strings and horns, the musicians ably decorate this collection of bittersweet melodies and gritty, spooky ballads with flourishes that add a lush dimension to the songs, while still allowing them to remain utterly earthy.

Vermillion’s influences are evident throughout his album, like in the album’s only cover, “Waiting Around To Die” by Townes Van Zandt, a rumbling, melancholy downer with the signature Johnny Cash slow locomotive rhythm. You can almost hear the ghost of Nick Drake in the tinkling acoustic guitars of “I Wasn’t Alone With You.” Relatively speaking, the song is bare, it’s just guitar and vocals, but it doesn’t need anything else. It’s perfect in its simplicity. And it’s moments like this, that the listener can truly recognize the potential of Vermillion’s considerable songwriting ability.


For the FULL review go to:

http://regulus2.azstarnet.com/blogs/subbacultcha/10340

WRITTEN BY: Adrienne Lake