Badly Drawn Boy

This low-key album received a huge amount of critical acclaim when it was released in 2000. The English singer combined a lo-fi approach with some modern studio tweakings and created a fine album of future folk. Tracks like "The Shining" and "Everybody's Stalking" provided a delicate balance between rustic and post-modern.

Intimate, low-light guitar riffs; fuzzy lyrics about candles and waterfalls; spindly, spidery
melodies -- Badly Drawn Boy plays sensitive white-boy blues for white boys who really
oughta know better. The Boy, also known as Manchester's Damon Gough, sounds like Elliott
Smith's English cousin, or Nick Drake's almost-upbeat nephew. Like Drake, he's mastered
the art of evoking melancholy without slathering on too much sentimentality. Be... More >

Damon Gough sounds a lot sadder than he is. It's more like he muses a lot, is easily distracted. On the page, "You left your shoes in the tree with me/I'll wear them to your house tonight" looks hopelessly stupid; on record, it's quite wry. Nor is he undemonstrative--unlike low-affect codependent Elliott Smith, he fusses so much over his tunes, crooning and segueing and arranging and stuff, that you know he loves them to death. You can imagine him being just as nice to a real live girl one of these years. (Grade - A-)