- This collaborative album was some time coming. Camera Obscura vocalist Tracyanne Campbell and Danny Coughlan, most noted for his Crybaby musical project, had already swapped song ideas at the time Campbell’s band put out their Desire Lines album in 2013. Then, tragically, their keyboardist Carey Lander passed away. Eventually, over 2016 and 2017, Tracyanne and Danny recorded in the Scottish highlands under the guidance of studio owner and co-producer Edwyn Collins.
The results are perhaps closer to Camera Obscura’s sophisticated, organic pop than Crybaby’s more gothic, angsty music, but the two collaborators have ultimately made something all their own. The musical landscape resembles a travelogue through various strands of pop songwriting and arrangement, frequently harking back to 60s doowop, country and the swinging London grandiosity of Phillips artists like Dusty Springfield and The Walker Brothers. In short, Tracyanne & Danny are both scholars of the classic pop songbook and the results positively gleam in this laid-back yet luminous album.
The first thing you hear is Tracyanne’s lake-pure tones on the single Home & Dry which is a melancholic ballad buoyed by a catchy hook and flourishes of flute and understated horn arrangements. There’s also a heartfelt tribute to Tracyanne’s friend and bandmate Carey in the country rock of Alabama, complete with yearning pedal steel. The gems keep coming with the sax-and-guitar led Deep In The Night, which, in terms of sound, has echoes of The Velvet Underground’s Femme Fatale. Danny’s more brooding, moody style is perhaps a bigger influence on the noir-ish balladry of Jacqueline, but both artists are generous at letting the other take the lead wherever necessary.
The other notable aspect of the album is the way Tracyanne & Danny’s vocals work together. They harmonise, sure, but these are first and foremost duets where they share lines individually and basically bounce their voices off each other. The contrasts in their vocals are pleasing – Tracyanne’s soulful purity and Danny’s more openly emotive and rawer tones.
Everything here works, from the baroque pop swoon of It Can’t Be Love Unless It Hurts (with hints of the aforementioned Dusty Springfield’s The Look Of Love) to closing slowie O Keeffe that manages a cute surprise in the form of Parisian-flavoured accordion which peppers the tune.
There are plenty of big emotions all over the record, from warm memories to heartbreak, all of it made rather luxurious to the ear in the form of immaculately crafted pop songs. This one’s a real treat.
- Matt Thrower.