Michael Nau – ‘Accompany’ album review: perfect music for people with ears
Michael Nau isn’t for everyone. For instance, those with dysfunctional ears or a perverse aversion to beauty might not like him, but for everyone else, he is a reason to rejoice. The prolific collaborator is back with his fourth full record simply sporting his name, and with Accompany, he has created the rare sort of triumph whereby you temporarily question why any other sort of album has ever existed.
The American multi-instrumentalist has a canny knack for creating perfection, one of the handiest facets an artist can have. This latest balm to the daily grind is a serene slew of lilting gems of the loose indie-folk variety. Nau-like in their composition, they are resplendent with country slide guitar and shimmering arrangements that bring the best out of his hooky central songwriting.
These songs might be pillow-propped and tranquil, but they are also laden with catchy choruses, and beneath the calm surface, toes are sent a’tapping as Nau croons earworms with the same effortlessness as a blackbird with a flair for structured melody. It’s this mix that makes you realise that we’re dealing with a selfless artist who puts ego aside when making a record.
All too often, an album this effortless would later be subjected to flashes of dissonance or ‘experimentation’, but Nau understands where Accompany will sit in people’s lives and presents it as a sweet gift of simplicity. In the best possible way, there is nothing to challenge or trip the listener. On the contrary, he has spent his time raking the path clear to be as welcoming as possible, easing you with a trail of breadcrumbs that leads to nothing other than a delicious loaf of freshly baked bread.
That is not to say that, within the swirling welter of sounds he creates, there aren’t progressive flourishes of pioneering electronic twists and evidence of tireless studio engineering, but these are all happily subsumed as functional parts of what make the tracks flow like a clear stream on a summers day. Take ‘Painting A Wall’, for instance. The song has an arsenal of instrumentation, a syncopated drum rhythm that, in isolation, sounds severely complex, and a slide guitar technique that takes 30 years on a porch to hone, but all of this amounts to a song so perfect you barely even think of it as being written.
Alas, it obviously has been written, and the superb snippets of poetry that pull you out from the daydream of sound for a moment, with lines like, “Waiting for the morning at the end of the day, it’s an impossible life to get over,” serve as evidence of highly considered creation, enraptured into flow. This, ultimately, renders ‘Painting A Wall’ one of the finest tracks this year, or from any year for that matter, but its humility means that it will probably not be shouted about, and Nau seems totally fine with that.
This typifies the accomplishment of Accompany. It’s a record that is happy to give so much and ask for nothing from the listener in return. As a result, those who are ensnared by its soothing medicine will soon form an addiction, and it will likely become one of the most dog-eared albums in their collection, soundtracking a thousand banal moments, making them just that little bit more beautiful.
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