Some albums require that you give them several shots. At first, I thought Pseudosix was just another lost and discontented folksinger trying to sound like Will Oldham or Jason Molina. In fact Tim Perry injects something special in Pseudosix that it would be an insult to consider him as a mere epigone. If Palace’s rustic weary shadow undeniably clouds over a couple of melancholy tracks (‘Run Rebel’, ‘Chasing you down’), Days of Delay is a subdued slow-burner that deserves attention.

Perry’s introverted voice has a tendency towards discretion but the overall spare musical aspect prevents it from disappearing in the oblivion it sometimes seems to look for. Delicate guitar strumming and vocals delivering shy melodies offer a charming bare quality reminiscent of Nick Drake (‘Bound to Unfold’, ‘Madness’, and the extremely moving ‘Put Your Back to the sun’, ‘Love and Logic’). Most of the time his two comrades, namely Emil Snizek (whose voice perfectly blends with Perry’s) and Joe Kelly from 31 Knots (who shows a totally different drums register here), give Perry a hand and regularly encrust his gentle slow folk songs with rhythmic jolts and urban fickle spirit (‘Center, Empty Circle’, ‘You started something’, ‘Hollow Abyss’, ‘The Next One’), sometimes pleasantly recalling David Grubbs (Rickets & Scurvy).

The lyrics mainly indicate that something has ominously been broken, tore apart like the hypnotic ‘Crooked Carousel’ suggests and it will certainly take a long time to fix what needs to be fixed. Running away sometimes seems the only way out implies Perry when he keeps singing in a resigned way ‘so long sorry so long’. In the best song ‘Circle, Empty Circle’, he slowly complains that ‘everybody’s talking so fast’, other voices answer in canon style ‘everybody’s talking so fast’, making the song reach a scary and eerie sense of loss, alienation and loneliness increased tenfold by life in modern cities, which strangely reminds me of the atmosphere of Sue and Fiona by Amos Kollek.

Days of Delay, a particular release for the otherwise emo label 54°40 or Fight!, had to contain something particular. Now that I’ve made the cd spin quite a few times, I must admit that this album in which sadness is often encapsulated in less than 3 minutes time has been growing on me a lot more than I expected. I’d like to recommend it to those of you who like American taciturn folk singers.

-SEB ‘talking so fast’ WOOd.

/jan 15th 2004/