Dave Wood, Into the Light (Own release, 2002)
The first thing that struck me on listening to this album was what a nice sounding guitar Dave plays, and how well it suited his style of playing and singing. It turned out to be a special hand-made acoustic by a small manufacturer in Devon called Brook Guitars. This just happens to be near the part of the world where Dave lives in Exeter. Here he also fronts Rifiki, a six piece world-jazz outfit, with its members drawn from the local jazz scene. They play material written by Dave, drawing on Latin and African rhythms, folk, soul, blues, jazz and beyond. However on Into the Light, Dave's first solo album, we here songs written by Dave that are safely encamped in the contemporary folk genre.
Into the Light has what could best be described as a peaceful mellow atmosphere. Very unpretentious singing, nicely accompanied by Dave on his guitar, but with some clever riffs and decoration that works well. His style of playing put me in mind, and is very reminiscent of the early Nick Jones / Martin Carthy / Chris Foster school of playing. According to the notes on the back cover, Dave recorded the album at the Beautiful Future Studio in two days, the 4th and 5th April 2002. No mean feat, there aren't many performers who can do this. Most professional singers can often take 3-4 months recording before they can get an album right.
For the most part Dave's material is very contemporary. The album starts with a song he wrote called 'Love Today' and 'Sundown' and is followed at track 3 with a nicely played instrumental called 'Song for J.T.', A tune inspired by James Taylor, when he couldn't afford, or perhaps justify, a £25 ticket to see him at a Plymouth venue. This sets the general mood of the album. However, next up is a traditional 'Lovely Joan' a song usually associated with Martin Carthy, but arranged in Dave's style, which fits in with the rest of the album, as does 'Careless Love' (trad).
I was pleasantly surprised to see how easy the Lennon & McCartney's song 'Wait' from their Rubber Soul album fit into Light. Can you imagine what prolific folk song writers John Lennon & Paul McCartney along with Rod Stewart might have been, if they had not become famous in the pop music field? My favourite track is one of Dave's songs 'May the Kindness', but there is plenty to please almost everyone's taste. Dave does a fine cover of Casey Bill Weldon's 'Go Ahead Buddy', a blues song. The ninth track is another instrumental; this time Dave plays a slide guitar style on the Turlough O'Carolan harp tune 'Sheebeg and Sheemore'. Next he returns to a finger-picked style with one of his own compositions, 'Healing Tune'. The penultimate track is the song 'Long Distance Love', and then the album closes gently with an instrumental of Dave's called 'Pastoral'.
Once again, what some people call semi-pro talent, impresses me; perhaps if Dave pursues a more professional career we may hear more from him. But in the meantime, in the absence of a dedicated Web site, the only way you can get your hands on this CD, which might well turn out to be a collector's item in the future, is to contact him direct by e-mail.
