Imagine easy listening, ethereal vocals, and a road trip chasing the sunset. That’s the slow-cooker of vibrations that cosmic indie-folk-rock band Dudley simmered up in the studio for their newest album, Beautiful Confusion.
First appearing on the scene in the ’90s, the band produced three albums in that time, before taking a brief, 30-year hiatus. But this spring, they returned with the sweet pick of guitar strings and the syrupy voice and pensive lyrics of singer-songwriter Ellen Turner.
The band was reborn: Turner teamed up with her pals Tom Lackner (drums), Joe Woodard (guitars), and Chris Symer (bass), when all were in Santa Barbara. It was a serendipitous reunion, sipping from the river of inspiration that runs through the region. They’ve once again brewed up a hot pot of folk-rock-whatever-the-hell-they’re-doing, and it tastes like soothing chicken soup for the psyche.
When I listened to the album for the first time, I was on the road with a friend.
I played the first, titular song, “Beautiful Confusion,” with its pining, passionate admissions. It smoothly transitioned to the second, “Deliverance,” which I interpreted as a reminder to, “Hey, be easy on yourself.” And then the third, “Can I Imagine,” featuring poetic soul-bearing from Turner — including a nod to her writing process itself — before ending on soft vocal drawls.
Until, eventually, “What are we listening to?” my friend asked me.
“Oh,” I replied, “this? It’s Dudley. One of the Indy‘s senior arts writers is in the band.”
“Is he a Big Thief fan?” he asked me (verbatim).
Joe Woodard, that aforementioned senior arts writer, actually compared Dudley’s sound to Big Thief — if they were 20 years older. Kindred spirits, he called them. Both bands have alt-rock vibes and a strong female lead whose voice sounds effortlessly mystical, like she had just finished some sort of magical ritual before jumping in the studio.
My friend laughed. “Damn, I’m good.”
Joe once described his guitar-playing to me as “noodly.” I took that not to mean floppy and weak, like a spaghetti noodle that’s been sitting in the pot for too long, but improvisational and light, his fingers flowing across the strings with expert attention like a nonna making pasta.
I would say this album contains a touch of that noodly-ness. But it is also well-produced and intentional. It is carefree in a carefully crafted way.
It is a smooth ride throughout, yet meanders in subtly different sonic directions. Never unmoored, it is anchored by Turner’s voice, remaining beautiful and warm.
Woodard describes it well. “Dudley boasts a sound of one’s own. Folk, pop and roll music and the power of a well-turned song vessel may be at the core of the operation, but the musical wardrobe is subject to change,” Woodard writes in his description of the album. “Vibes morph,” he says, from the calmly anthemic spirit of the opening track, to haunted musings, to jubilance, to a “post-Haight Ashbury-esque jamdown.”
“Turner eloquently ponders love, life, nature and spirituality, and other matters in her lyrics,” he said. Those lyrics are more-often-than-not wonderfully empathetic, with a sweet forgiveness that leaves the listener feeling lighter.
So, what’s it all about?
“Maybe a letting go of needing to know,” Woodard suggested. “As the lyric goes in Turner’s title tune: ‘It’s shocking to my heart / How I run from imperfection / Always looking for a missing part / But there’s a beautiful confusion to it all.’”
For more information, see householdink.com/dudley.
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