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David Saw

Broken Down Figure

(Iris; US: 4 Mar 2008; UK: Available as import)

Coming from the same place as literally hundreds of singer-songwriters, David Saw is best when he is at is most barren. Songs such as “Don’t Call” aren’t the poppy Dylan-meets-Jason Mraz fodder radio playlists yearn for, but it is a gorgeous tune nonetheless. The musician, who has the chops to get his songs across without much padding or layering of sounds, comes to the life on the aptly named “Simple Song” which is quite pleasing and light. The title track has a minimal amount of strings but isn’t anything too distracting to the overall gist of the song as Saw sounds a bit weary in the vein of Ryan Adams or John Mayer without the gloss. However “Buy My Record” is an up-tempo but rather bland attempt at pop folk. A song like this would be the type which might prevent people from purchasing the record. Fortunately, the gentle, summery, Jack Johnson-leaning “Savannah’s World” atones for the previous screw up. Meanwhile “All At Sea” recalls some of the best work Ron Sexsmith did early in his career. Saw commands your attention and fortunately for the listener it’s not difficult trying to meet him at least halfway, especially on the melodic “Some Love” which is about, gasp, a person’s broken heart. And if Saw’s performance thus far was still up in the air for the cynics, even The Beatles-que “Someone’s Gonna Love You” is bound to warm you up to Mr. Saw.

Rating:

Originally from Cape Breton, MacNeil is currently writing for the Toronto Sun as well as other publications, including All Music Guide, Billboard.com, NME.com, Country Standard Time, Skope Magazine, Chart Magazine, Glide, Ft. Myers Magazine and Celtic Heritage. A graduate of the University of King's College, MacNeil currently resides in Toronto. He has interviewed hundreds of acts ranging from Metallica and AC/DC to Daniel Lanois and Smokey Robinson. MacNeil (modestly referred to as King J to friends), a diehard Philadelphia Flyers fan, has seen the Rolling Stones in a club setting, thereby knowing he will rest in peace at some point down the road. Oh, and he writes for PopMatters.com.


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