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The Guilfordian

The student news site of Guilford College

The Guilfordian

The student news site of Guilford College

The Guilfordian

Pick Me Up Love…Everyday:

With 12 tracks on the latest Dave Matthews Band release Everyday and none of the songs running over four minutes, it would seem that the band is at a crossroads. One road goes to their already amazing critical and commercial success and doing more of the same style of free flowing pop/jam rock. The other road leads toward perhaps an even greener pasture of pop success, making an album with more radio appeal than any of their other previous albums. With Everyday, they choose the radio route, and it has brought the Dave Matthews Band to a new level of music.Abandoning longtime producer Steve Lilywhite, the Dave Matthews Band felt that it was time for a change, a change in the type of the album they wanted to make. Glen Ballard, perhaps best known for his work on Alanis Morisette’s multi-platinum album Jagged Little Pill was brought in to help give the group and fresh and more refined sound. His goal was to bring a song that might take seven minutes to finally come together, to compact it and bring it closer to a four-minute mark. In essence that is what this album is, a tighter and more compact version of the Dave Matthews Band.

Some might scream bloody murder that somebody would try to limit the abilities of five very talented musicians, with the end result being a weaker album. Everyday, however, is more cohesive than it is dysfunctional. Instead of an album that feels like sandpaper, it more often than not feels like silk, smooth and beautiful.

Perhaps the highlight of the album is the title track “Everyday,” which is a reworked version of a previous DMB song, “#36.” Its stunning vocals and distinct African beat is the best of example of Ballard’s discipline in the studio combined with the musical roots of the band. “Mother Father” has a Latin rhythm and beat, which is complemented by Carlos Santana, who guests on the song playing acoustic guitar.

In the center of this entire album is Dave Matthews himself, the South African melody maker whose beautiful lyrics make this album a winner. He has been seen as a cross between Sting with his pop sound, Peter Gabriel and his lyrics, and Eddie Vedder in a voice that sounds like no other. With this album, you get the sense that Matthews has something to say, and he is going to speak whether anybody is going to listen or not.

The album does not work at all times, however; “What You Are” does not benefit from the Ballard’s production style and is perhaps the only track where you get the sense that the band is holding back. Those points are few and far between, however, and this album works on so many other levels that it is easy to look past the few areas of weakness.

For a band that has averaged over 200 concerts over the past 10 years, this album is definitely the road less traveled for the type of music they have played before. New beats, rhythms, and lyrics that are more focused than they have ever been before make Everyday the strongest album put out by the Dave Matthews Band. Everyday does not break new musical ground, but that was not its goal. The goal was to bring all the parts of the Dave Matthews Band together, and it succeeds beautifully. It takes a lot of courage for a band to abandon its old style and try to make something that is completely different. For a less talented band, the results might be mixed, but with the Dave Matthews Band, the result is perhaps the best album of 2001.

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