Proper release for Dark Night of the Soul

// July 13th, 2010 // Music Reviews

After a lengthy legal dispute between EMI records and the artist Danger Mouse, his collaborative album (with Mark Linkous, AKA Sparklehorse and David Lynch …. yes, that one) Dark Night of the Soul [link] has finally been given a proper release. It featured in my list of favourite albums of last year and this release may give me an excuse to repeat it in this year’s list too. Given the title of the record and the fact that both Mark Linkous and guest vocalist Vic Chesnutt committed suicide within the last year you might be forgiven for dismissing it as being rather bleak. While there is certainly a searching introspective undercurrent throughout, the record is also inspiringly beautiful.

The opening section of Dark Night of the Soul reminds me a lot of Sparklehorse’s brilliant It’s a Wonderful Life of 2001. In fact, despite the wealth of talented collaborators involved here, ranging from Nina Persson, Gruff Rhys, Wayne Coyne, Jason Lytle, Iggy Pop and Suzanne Vega, it is the influence of Mark Linkous that comes through most strongly throughout the 13 tracks. There is enough variety of musical style here to appeal to fans of many different genres of music and Danger Mouse ties it all together with masterful production. Very highly recommended.

Inspired by a David Lynch photoshoot, here’s a video preview of the tracks on the record.