IRON AND WINE – AROUND THE WELL

There are few more intimate musical experiences than sitting back, eyes closed, body relaxed, and listening to Sam Beam’s (aka Iron and Wine) gentle strum and hauntingly hushed tones caress their way through your consciousness. Perhaps had you been the lone figure in attendance while Simon and Garfunkle sang Bridge Over Troubled Water then you might understand. In the usual course of events one would run a mile from an album of covers, soundtrack numbers and rarities. In this case Samuel has managed to cohere them into a beguiling look at an artist who can inhabit any song; be it making the Flamming Lips’ Waiting For Superman a simple folk spiritual or The Postal Service’s Such Great Heights a gentle lullaby. The only other artists so capable of  taking anothers tune and making it their own with such finesse is Nina Simone. Where Beam can fall down, in writing and singing the same song over again, is where he excels. Two discs, 23 songs, many song-writers, only one Iron and Wine. How simple is that?

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