Seth Sherman’s 2011 release, When the Moment Is True, still happens to be one of my favorites. Phenomenal. On it, he plays all the instruments and provides the vocals for each song. It should come as no surprise, though, in regards to a musician as talented as he is. I’ve said before, such is the strategy of an incredibly skilled and knowledgeable musical perfectionist who combs over every detail with great care.
The album came together from solo tracks he’d written after playing with different bands in Austin and other cities, and with some deeply personal material he’d penned after dealing with depression. The result is a beautiful mix of pop, folk and rock, influenced by ‘60s and ‘70s musical artists who, as Sherman has explained, were inspired by country blues.
As Sherman produced his solo work, he formed a band for live performances and collaborative songwriting projects, including songwriter, keyboardist and artist Dieter Ray Langendorf (Halaska), drummer Steve Anderson, bassist Drew Schlegel, guitarist Morris Ramos, and vocalist Devon McDermott.
Interestingly, I did not select a track from When the Moment Is True for today’s AMM, but instead chose an acoustic piece from an extraordinary bit of work named AIWDS. I failed at pronouncing the strange name because there’s no way of pronouncing it. Recorded in 2004, the album title, and the handful of fictitious, unpronounceable song titles, were inspired by a language game Sherman used to play with a friend, where W’s were placed in words and those who weren’t in on the gag had a tough time pronouncing them.
Again, I can’t emphasize enough how great it is to see Seth Sherman live (I was lucky enough to catch him and his band perform this year at an E.A.S.T. show at the home of The Lonesome Heroes‘ Landry McMeans and Rich Russell). He performed Wednesday December, 26th at Holy Mountain, 617 E. 7th St. Rounding out the bill is Picardy III. Recommended.
AMM-Dec-25th-2012 << Download
