Bill Callahan (or, the artist formerly known as Smog) has always been a dry wit, writing darkly off-kilter, endearingly odd poetry that happened to feature lovely instrumental support. And when an album begins with a line like "drinking while sleeping," you know you've stepped into Callahan's land, where surrealism seems earthy and natural, where dreams are one with the dust.
Dream River flows casually in cadence with Callahan's droll, borderline monotone vocals. Its images are sharp and grim, full of mysterious metaphors: "You looked like worldwide Armaggedon while you slept;" "...connected to the land like a severed hand;" "...like a sorcerer's cape the rain ripped the lips off the mouth of the bay." Frequently backed by seventies-style flutes and consistently featuring Callahan's cryptic but ever-inviting work on guitar, the album is weirdly rich and richly weird.
Never showy or over-experimental in musical execution, Dream River makes the mundane unusual. Callahan, with his "pilgrim's guts" and insistence that "life ain't confidential," ventures into the essential ironies of everyday being with the shrewdness of an experienced traveller. Dream River is an accomplished, often gorgeous, sonic companion on the row-row-row-your-boat journey down life's merry way.
Grade: A-
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