Dolorean, You Can’t Win (Yep Roc)

[March 14th, 2007] [ACOUSTIC LONELINESS] With a title like You Can't Win, one might expect Dolorean's latest release to be more than a little sad. And it is: The first thing you hear frontman/centerpiece Al James sing--after the title track's endless refrain of "You can't win"--is "Autumn ends/ Winter comes and everybody's gone." And the ensuing pity party would break down even Richard Simmons into the fetal position.

Much of the tearjerking comes from James' understated, mossy vocals. He sings as if he had just slid out of a coma: relearning each syllable, tackling them slowly while searching for strength enough to sustain the notes. It's haunting, and it dovetails sweetly with the minimalist, lonely aesthetic of You Can't Win's mostly acoustic instrumentation. But the loneliness Dolorean chronicles on You Can't Win is of the self-imposed variety. "Just leave us to our own device," James sings on the piano-and-banjo-driven ballad "We Winter Wrens": "We winter wrens are fine." The statement almost sounds spiteful and sarcastic--until he adds, "There's no mistake of the call we make/ When no one else is around." Isolation, James is saying, equals better art.

He then turns around and questions the wisdom of that sentiment on "Heather, Remind Me How This Ends," a divorce ballad that peers out regretfully on an old flame's embers from a slow-moving train. All this melodrama seems at home in the Northwest, where the long, wet winter months can slow life down to a crawl. These songs, too, sound like rainstorms that only Oregonians are patient enough to wait out. And "Beachcomber Blues" sounds like the Oregon coast, with Ben Nugent's brushed drumming and Laura Gibson's harmonies blowing in like ocean winds. I spent most of my life near Oregon's beaches, and they are truly as beautiful and miserable as, well, Dolorean.

Loneliness, James admits, will drive a man to drink ("What One Bottle Can Do") and hallucinate ("My Still Life"). But rather than turn his back on the waves of heartbreak that besiege him, James collects the driftwood and builds a home with it. That's what makes Dolorean beautiful. And it's what makes You Can't Win a winner. Now, if you'll pardon me, I've got some sobbing to do. CASEY JARMAN.