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Crazy Talk Reviews
Gonzookanagan ***½
Here is the 8th album from this Toronto area troubadour. Crazy Talk is gentle, unassuming company as Gladstone ambles between folk, rock, world and jazz genres. Sounding like a mix of Raffi and Jonathan Richman (the guy that keeps showing up in odd places in There’s Something About Mary), this disc is real easy on the ears.
Of his stuff The Toronto Star says “if you heard this music in a crowded room you’d swear it was a lost gem from another time”, an interesting thought and I really get where they’re coming from. With Howard’s laid back singing and ‘ordinary’ voice (not a criticism by the way), Crazy Talk has a Mark Knopfler vibe to it too, particularly Mark’s solo records like The Ragpicker’s Dream. Crazy Talk is gentle, unassuming company as Gladstone ambles between folk, rock, world and jazz genres backdrop for his lyrical observation which range from tender to poignant and biting.
Gladstone’s band is really tuned in to what he’s after and the production is masterful. That group, which backs him during a monthly residency at Toronto’s Tranzac Club, includes Tony Quarrington (guitar), Laura Fenandez (vocals), Bob Cohen (bass)and Ambrose Pottie (drums), with several more of TO’s finest players joining for an album release performance Sept.25th at the Dakota Tavern. No doubt they will play much of Crazy Talk as well as selections from his other albums, and if I didn’t live all the way across the country, I’d be tempted to drop by
Crazy Talk is one of those albums that you won’t listen to all the time; but then there’ll be times when nothing else will do. Link to review:
https://gonzookanagan.com/the-rock-doctors-hot-wax-album-reviews-week-of-sept-24/
Canadian Beats
Contemporary roots-folk singer-songwriter Howard Gladstone has unveiled his eighth album, Crazy Talk, via Sonic Peach Music. This diverse collection of twelve tracks blends folk, jazz, rock, and world music, showcasing Gladstone’s signature storytelling.
To celebrate the release, a special concert will take place at Toronto’s iconic Dakota Tavern on Wednesday, September 25, featuring a stellar band including Tony Quarrington (guitar), Laura Fernandez (vocals), Bob Cohen (bass), and Ambrose Pottie (drums), alongside some of Toronto’s finest musicians. As part of the event, Gladstone will also debut his book Timepieces – Selected Lyrics, praised by veteran songwriter James Gordon as “a remarkably compelling collection.”
The album begins with “Show a Little Love” which is a heartfelt reflection on what it means to be an artist in today’s digital world. With its rootsy folk feel, the song dives into the struggles of creating music, forging connections, and the emotional effort behind every song. Lines like “For free I give it willingly / Or hear it stream from The Machine” capture how musicians often give so much without getting much back. The repeated chorus, “Show a little love to me,” feels like a quiet plea for appreciation, reminding us there’s a real person behind the music.
The title track, “Crazy Talk,” is a witty and introspective gem that captures a classic country vibe. Gladstone pays homage to Patsy Cline while exploring the quirky ups and downs of love. The playful chorus, “That’s crazy talk… but then again, I’m crazy too,” perfectly highlights this shared madness. Blending personal reflection with a hint of social commentary, his lyrics strike a balance between lightheartedness and sincerity.
The album closes with “That’s How It Goes,” a haunting, thought-provoking track that reflects on conflict, loss, and the enduring hope for freedom. With vivid imagery like “The broken sky pours down the pain” and “Teddy bear with blood stain,” Gladstone captures the harsh realities of war while repeating the phrase “That’s how it goes” to emphasize the cyclical nature of violence.
With its heartfelt lyrics, diverse themes, and rich musicality, Crazy Talk is sure to resonate with fans of folk and country alike, making it a significant contribution to the genre.
Link to review: https://canadianbeats.ca/2024/09/20/howard-gladstone-crazy-talk-album-review/
BTW – Lenny Stoute
“Crazy Talk,” the title track of Howard Gladstone’s upcoming album, is a lighthearted, lazy, jazzy shuffle that pays lyrical homage to Patsy Cline, The Beatles, and Robbie Robertson. The song features delightful backing vocals from JAZZ-FM radio host and musician Laura Fernandez; a mellow bass solo from Bob Cohen; and a sprightly electric guitar solo from the great Tony Quarrington – who co-wrote the song (and four others on the album), and also produced the LP. Says Quarrington, “‘Crazy Talk’ is a loping, good-natured ramble through various topics: country music, love, revolution, and lots besides.”
It’s also a good-natured sizing up of this thing called love, which can offer up the sweetest dream or craziest nightmare, endure for eons or fall like a leaf in a stiff wind. Gladstone’s mellow, been there done it baritone supplies just the right amount of emotional heft. It makes you think, gives you the wink, a celebration that bids you beware and it’s over far too soon. If the rest of the album’s gonna be like this, dude has him a solid winner here.
CONCORD SESSION REVIEWS (2021)
A charming new record here, the 7th, from this Toronto-based folkie. Part James Taylor/ part Bruce Cockburn, Howard Gladstone’s The Concord Sessions focuses on the broader picture of where we are at collectively as a species, exposing many sides of our nature, our strengths, weaknesses and foibles. It is a relaxed, intimate, and urgent experience.
There’s a story behind the creation of this album. “Three years after suffering a spinal cord injury, I recovered sufficiently to write the songs and record the album Hourglass” Howard says. “Immediately upon finishing (that), I asked the same musical crew to return to Concord Avenue Studio the following week, and we recorded the tracks being released as The Concord Sessions.” Of this album, recorded in 2017 over a 2-day period then released just last month, “Gladstone notes that “What you hear now is what went down in the studio over the two day recording period, there are no overdubs. The only thing that was added was background vocals. It’s recorded in high resolution audio so every nuance and wrinkle is audible.” That reminds me of James Taylor’s Dad Loves His Work (81), mixed with ‘The Aphex Aural Exciter’- the sound there is exquisite too.
Howard’s bright, shimmering acoustic guitar and warm, distinctly un-mannered vocal style make The Concord Sessions pretty effortless to warm up to. Two singles, Building A Fence and The World’s A Warmer Place are deceptive in their gentle friendliness. Fence is an upbeat, bluesy kind of tune that deals with themes of division, privilege, separation and impending crises. Warmer Place explores the climate crisis we face and those who are subsequently displaced by the disrupted weather patterns. The easy company throughout of Tony Quarrington, George Koller, Bob Scott and Laura Fernandez help make this disc the delightful company it is, along with the recording, engineering, mixing and mastering talents of Concord owner Peter J. Moore.
At its most basic, The Concord Sessions is an engaging folk album about some pretty deep subjects; definitely worth checking out.
BEST TRACKS: Building A Fence, Occupy, World’s Become A Warmer Place
-Gonzo Okanagan
THE PROMISE REVIEWS (2020)
The ‘Promise’ is a voyage through your mind by Gary 17, Toronto Moon Magazne
-By Gary 17, TorontoMoon.ca
I figured it was a good time to check out the video of one of the songs, “Paradise, Passing Through,” that’s available free on YouTube.
I was rewarded by a lovely yet poignant voyage to another world, where a song with lyrics sweet and pointed in turn describes how lush flora and lusty human fauna were at one time free to be what they are, but which situation has been transformed over time by modern life even as has the sad reminiscer.
The song arose from a visit Gladstone made to Polynesia, where contrasts of natural and manufactured habits are apparently stark.
Gladstone says that “like countless others, I struggled with how to get through the dark days of the 2020 coronavirus lockdown. In the early days of isolation, I wrote some lines that became the song “Someday” and although “I had no intention initially of recording an album, over a period of two months it happened.”
This is an album for people who are prepared to take the time to let themselves be absorbed in language conveying messages with artful lyrics and buoyed up by sensitive yet powerful music that comes largely courtesy of guitarist Kevin Laliberte accompanying the songwriter/poet on most of the tracks, along with other talents filling out the atmosphere to help highlight the vocals.
Howard is not a natural singer —more of a talker/lecturer— but over the years and several albums he’s come to understand his voice and learned how to bend and stretch it to create interesting, poignantly genuine and ultimately captivating vocals.
Howard Gladstone Trio featuring Laura Fernandez and Tony Quarrington
Those vocals are delivering observations, messages and light polemic in a way that is designed to appeal to literate people. When spinning this disc (or streaming it) you need to block out other distractions and let it seep into your consciousness, where Gladstone’s mildly urgent and unique vocals and the accompanying music will carry you along to a place from which you’ll have a higher understanding of many things.
If I have one criticism it’s perhaps that he has a tendency to produce songs that go on just a little too long. Most are over four minutes and contain repetitions that in many cases are unnecessary since he’s already convincingly made his point. But that’s a trifle of a complaint that wiffles away once you’re caught up in the spells he creates.
The lead off track, “Woodstock Fifty,” is a tender and captivating nostalgic voyage and sets the stage for the interesting use of minor keys that resonates throughout the entire disc. Lyrically it’s wistful and somewhat painful as the singer realizes you can’t recapture what was but only go forward with what’s left in memory.
On the final number, “Crossroads,” the polemic that is both implicit and gently explicit throughout the disc becomes more dominant and forceful in a song that suggests we are as a species at a crucial existential junction, facing “extinction or rebirth.”
In between Gladstone uses the interplay between minor and major keys to create auras of mystery and drama, such as on “Birds of Spain,” where a faux-Spanish atmosphere helps him convey ironic or even sarcastic lyrics that deliver his message about the consequences of war after the fighting stops.
On “Paradise, Passing Through” lush imagery and music transports us to a lovely place but then, almost in David Attenborough fashion, resolves in a painful realization that things there have changed and what was once so lovely has been tarnished.
On “The Promise,” a kind of lullaby, he makes minor keys warm and embracing, while on his cover of “There Is Only Love” by Jon Brooks, using some symphonic musical accompaniment highlighting viola player Chairman Louis, he creates a kind of hymn to deliver a philosophical message about life, death and the earth all bound together by love.
The accompanying musicians are a big part of helping to make this deeply thoughtful album more accessible. Kevin Laliberte (guitar), Russ Boswell (bass), Marito Marques (drums) accompany Gladstone on “Paradise, Passing Through” as well as six of the album’s nine songs. Laura Fernandez and/or Julie Gladstone add background vocals on six of the tracks, and Bob Cohen plays guitar/bass on three songs.
It’s worth noting too that this disc, like everything he and the cohort of artists he has assembled through his Sonic Peach record company, was created using super high-res format that delivers a far richer experience than mp3s, wav files and other audio configurations. The details can be found on the company’s website.
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Copyright 2020 by Gary Webb-Proctor & TorontoMoon.ca
Gary 17@ TorontoMoon.ca * therealgary17@gmail.com
INTERVIEW ABOUT THE PROMISE
Five Questions With Howard Gladstone – Canadian Beats, October 2020
Toronto, ON-based contemporary folk-rocker Howard Gladstone has released his newest single, “Paradise, Passing Through”. The song is the first to arrive ahead of Gladstone’s forthcoming and sixth album, The Promise, set for release on October 9th, 2020.
“Paradise, Passing Through” was composed during a marvelous trip through Polynesia that offered time for musical reflections on history, art, beauty, inspiration, colonization, religion, commerce, even the transitory nature of our time in the world, Gladstone shares. The song has a dreamy, lush tonality that drifts between major and minor coupled with haunting imagery reinforced by Kevin Laliberte’s precise guitar work.
Care to introduce yourself to our readers?
My name is Howard Gladstone, I was born and have lived in Toronto all my life. I’m old enough to have seen the Beatles at Maple Leaf Gardens as a kid and young enough to stay active writing and performing my own original material. I grew up in a chaotic, slightly dysfunctional musical household in North York where everybody played guitars, pianos, and sang.
Our dad played and sang old-time tunes, accompanied himself on a rare Gibson 4-string tenor guitar, sang in a barbershop band, listened to Dixieland, early jazz, some classics, and Broadway shows. So that’s the music I first heard, and then early rock and roll on transistor radios. During the folk days, I played in the university pubs, while studying English at York University. I was pursuing journalism and wrote many articles, mostly reviewing music. My interview with Robbie Robertson was reprinted in Rolling Stone magazine.
I was so influenced/overwhelmed by the great songwriters and musicians in the early days of folk and rock, that I was influenced not to write much. For some years thereafter, I honed my writing craft, before finally feeling confident enough to release my first album of original songs “Sunflowers Light The Room” in 2001. Since then I’ve released five albums in total, with the sixth album “The Promise” coming up soon. I’ve been called a late bloomer, and that’s fine with me.
To balance things out, I have run an electronics company in the audio and musical industry. I also co-founded and presented the Toronto City Roots Festival from 2004-10. In 2014, I had a life-changing experience: a spinal cord injury, resulting in emergency surgery, and a long slow recovery. The experience taught me the importance of resilience, and not to give up hope.
During that period, my album of recovery, Hourglass, was born In 2017, I co-founded a record label, Sonic Peach Music. In the current streaming world, where musicians receive pittances, and live performance is limited, creating a record label is truly a labour of love. My album “The Promise” and all the music on our label is released in both Standard resolution (CD quality) and High Resolution (HD) quality, for an enhanced musical experience. My audiophile background insists on it.
Tell us a bit about your music and writing style.
As a songwriter, I never know where and how inspiration will strike. But it is as much about hard work and craft as about inspiration. Here are some comments on songs from the new album “The Promise” that provide some insight into the range and diversity of subject matter and approach.
“Woodstock Fifty” was written in August 2019, pretty much on the exact anniversary of that historic cultural landmark, and contemplates memory, and keeping hopes and dreams alive – if possible. Musically I guess it is reminiscent of the Byrds and Jesse Colin Young, not to mention Joni M.
“Birds of Spain” erupted immediately after returning from a 2019 trip to that special land. It offers an emotional response to the fate of exiles and the oppressed. Kevin Laliberte added a powerful flamenco guitar performance, which is exactly how I envisioned the song.
“Someday,” emerged during the early dark days of the pandemic, with the thought that we can, must, and will do better. Keep hope alive. It’s a litany of pledges and promises.
“The Promise” was written in early 2020 to celebrate the joyous occasion of new birth, and became the title song and central focus of the album. How will we keep a promise to a new generation, when we as humans are destroying the gifts we are given? “There’s a light keeps shining through. ” I didn’t think of it at the time, but perhaps I was trying to write a song as beautiful as “Wonderful World” or “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”. Old-time stuff.
“Crossroads” is both desolate and hopeful, a hybrid protest song. It was written to help focus more attention on the climate crisis, and the opportunity it allows for a rebirth, led by a younger generation. it’s a topical song, but one that is meant to last longer than a season – hopefully it could become an anthem. Musically, Dire Straights and Pink Floyd came to mind.
As can be seen, I have a craftsman approach to lyric writing, and often approach the subject matter as a seasoned journalist would: with an eye for detail, and a sense of story.
Other songs reflect a more lyrical and romantic side. I often think of songs as a type of multi-faced musical prism and can be experienced differently depending on how the light strikes. Musically, eclectic is me.
Do you have any upcoming shows? For someone who has yet to see you live, how would you explain your live performance?
As a singer-songwriter, I normally accompany myself on acoustic guitar. My usual accompanists are Tony Quarrington (guitar, vocal harmony), and Laura Fernandez (background vocal, piano). We focus on getting the harmonies right, and I focus on selling the song by finding the meaning and emotion in the lyric. In addition to my originals, we often feature songs by Tony and Laura – each stand-out writers and performers. Bob Cohen might on occasion sub in on guitar or play electric bass.
If you were asked to suggest only one of your songs for someone to hear, which would it be?
The song “Paradise, Passing Through” is the second track on the new album, The Promise. It was composed in 2018 during a marvelous trip through Polynesia that offered time for reflecting on history (human and natural), art, beauty, inspiration, colonization, religion, commerce, even the transitory nature of our time in the world. It’s a lush lilting waltz, and directly references Gaugin’s magical sojourn in the South Seas.
It has a dreamy tonality that drifts between major and minor keys, and some very haunting imagery. Ocean-like guitar swells (by Kevin Laliberte), and ethereal background vocals (Laura Fernandez, Julie Gladstone), complete the spell.
We made a music video for this tune. The Japanese videographer Tomo Nogi has created a very evocative, sensual video that is available on Youtube, or my website.
Canadian Beats is all about Canadian music, so who are your current favourite Canadian bands/ artists?
I’ll admit my bias, but I’m very partial to the other artists on the Sonic Peach Music label. Laura Fernandez’ new album “Okay, Alright”, in my opinion, is destined to become a classic album. It combines jazz, pop, and classical musical elements, with a unique and honest confessional vocal style, great musicianship, and powerful and emotional lyrics.
Tony Quarrington and Zoey Adams are the duo Q&A and are releasing three EPs on the Sonic Peach label this fall, highlighting their diverse songwriting and performing styles – jazz, pop, and folk. Great tunes, production, and performance. Jon Brooks, whose song “There Is Only Love” I cover on my new album, is a vital and important songwriter.
On my new album, I had the pleasure to work with Kevin Laliberte, a guitarist who can play brilliantly in a variety of styles, including flamenco and world. Kevin is a founding member of “Sultans of String” whose great new album “Refuge” deserves more attention; he also plays with Amanda Martinez, and I am a fan of her new album.
I’m also a fan of Marito Marques, a fantastic drummer from Coimbra, Portugal, now resident in Canada who has some interesting original material; he plays on my album “The Promise” and shines throughout, particularly the off-kilter waltz “It All Falls Down” where his odd percussion songs are featured. Russ Boswell plays bass with everybody.
I can name a dozen or more below-the-radar singer/songwriters in town who deserve more recognition…. it is a strong musical community in Toronto, and all across this country in fact.
Rick Keene Music Scene – Howard Gladstone’s New Album ‘The Promise’ Provides Sunshine Through Dark Clouds
Howard Gladstone ‘s voice is needed desperately amid these troubling times.
In a world filled with catchy loops and fabricated sounds dominating the record charts – a conscience is required to keep things grounded. The Album ‘The Promise’, Gladstone’s sixth release, does just that. With different sensibilities and poignant lyrics – Gladstone just may be Canada’s most recent version of Bob Dylan.
HOURGLASS REVIEWS (2017)
Review by Rootstime
“Hourglass” is the title of the fifth album by Canadian singer-songwriter Howard Gladstone from Toronto. Together with singer with Spanish roots Laura Fernandez and strings virtuoso Tony Quarrington (guitars, mandolin, sitar) he usually performs as folk trio, but for this record he also has bassist George Koller and drummer ‘Great’ Bob Scott in the recording studio.
For three years, Howard Gladstone’s health condition was seriously threatened by a severe spinal cord injury that led to total paralysis. But once that disease was overcome, he started to compose new songs for this record with renewed energy and passion. Nine compositions took the track list of “Hourglass”, including one adaptation of a poetic work by the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca in the song “Rider’s Song (Cordoba)”.
In the song “Granada Nights” on the loss of love and freedom in a live performance, Howard Gladstone and Laura Fernandez sing a duet, in which Laura sings her text in Spanish and Tony Quarrington plays a beautiful guitar solo. The album opener “My Heart Will not Let Me Keep Still” is a romantic love song that is exclusively accompanied by acoustic guitar playing.
Howard Gladstone is a modern folk troubadour who sings his poetic song lyrics about love, hope, optimism and desire in a gentle way and occasionally recalls memories of artists like sixties-folky Tim Hardin and the storytelling Leonard Cohen, especially in songs as “In The Moment”, “When We Fall” and “Still Got So Long To Go”. In addition, the two more up-tempo songs “Seven Years To The Day” and “The Road Is Me” provide a pleasant change with the ballads on this nice listenable album.
After the debut album “Sunflowers Light The Room”, “Candles On The River” from 2005, “The Breath In The Wind” from 2007 and “Roots And Rain” from 2009 released in 2002, it was quite a long wait new musical work of this Howard Gladstone, but the quality of “Hourglass” proves that the years of waiting was totally worth it. (Translated from Dutch).
Penguin Eggs December 2017
Hourglass is the fifth album release for the Toronto-based singer-songwriter Howard Gladstone. And it’s a blend of superior guitar work, introspective lyrics, with an intermittent Latin undertone. Gladstone is joined by Laura Fernandez on vocals, Tony Quarrington on guitar, George Koller on bass, and Bob Scott on drums.
The nine tracks are themed around the concept of passing time, as symbolized by, well … an hourglass. While the Latin influence songs such as Rider’s Song (Cordoba) or Granada Nights provide much of the albums successful Bent, Hourglass is, all in all, a real pleasant listen.
– by Phil Harries
CJN – Howard Gladstone wrote most of the songs recorded on his latest album, Hourglass, during the three years he was recovering from spinal cord surgery.
He was suffering from spinal stenosis. It is caused by the narrowing of the spaces in the spine, which puts pressure on the nerves and spinal cord. Before his surgery, Gladstone had a mild case of osteoarthritis in his back that had never bothered him much. In 2014, he took a holiday to the Galapagos Islands and Machu Picchu, a fairly strenuous vacation on which he was doing some difficult climbs, he said. The day he got home, he felt his arms becoming paralyzed. In the middle of the night, he was admitted to hospital, and within 24 hours, he was on the operating table.
After the surgery, he was almost completely paralyzed. He was transferred to the Lyndhurst Centre, a spinal cord rehabilitation facility in Toronto. His prognosis for recovery was moderately optimistic. “I was told in six to 18 months, I had a very good chance to make a good recovery, but nobody would guarantee it and nobody knew for sure,” he said. Now, three years later, he’s walking without an assistive device, and he says he’s “not 100 per cent, but pretty good.”
Gladstone said that he found that music aided in his recovery. “The first time I heard live music during my rehabilitation, I broke into tears, some combination of emotional release of sorrow and joy,” he said. And making the music for Hourglass, his fifth album, was cathartic, he added.
At a low point during his recovery, Gladstone challenged himself to write a song. “This was a project to prove to myself I could still write music after feeling emotionally numb,” he said.
He was so pleased with result: the song Never Thought You’d Call, in which he moves from despair, when his “river’s turned to ice” and he’s “feeling small, locked out of paradise,” to joy, when he welcomes “love” shining into his life and says that, “It sure feels right.”
Gladstone, a singer-songwriter who was influenced by the 1960s folk music revival, has been playing guitar for most of his life, but after his surgery, his hands were immobile. “Music is so important and integral to my life that it’s almost as depressing (to) not (be) able to play the guitar, as losing the ability to walk,” he said.
Gladstone is modest about his guitar playing – he’s no Bruce Cockburn or Eric Clapton, he says – but the guitar is an essential part of his sound, along with his relaxed vocal style. “The guitar is part of the way for me to express the emotion and feel of the music, to find the right balance of lyric and melody,” he said.
A year after his surgery, still unable to press his fingers down on his guitar strings, he experimented with open tuning, which allowed him to strum his fingers across the strings to produce chords. With help from low-level laser therapy, he’s now at the point where he says he can get by as a guitarist.
But he does more than just get by on Hourglass, a collection of nine exquisite songs about human fragility and strength, as time ticks away.
He wrote the song, When We Fall, in open tuning, “with as few words as possible, to convey all the ideas in the album,” he said. “To me, it’s almost like a haiku – to be as economical with language as possible – to convey the sense of fragility, of mortality, but in spite of that, to get back up when you fall.”
Gladstone is now a volunteer at the Lyndhurst Centre, where he talks to people with injuries similar to his own. He tries to give them a message of hope, he said. “I say, ‘I was paralyzed, I was in a wheelchair, I was immobile and I was told I had a chance to recover and I focused on that goal. That was the only hope I had.’ I’m hopeful that same message will come through in the songs.”
The album, which was produced by Gladstone’s guitarist, Tony Quarrington, will be released by Gladstone and Laura Fernandez’s new label, Sonic Peach. Fernandez, a sweetly powerful vocalist, sings several duets with Gladstone on the album. – Ruth Schweitzer
Howard’s Glass Menagerie – Paul Corby
September 6, 2017: There is a new release, Hourglass, from Sonic Peach Music that marks the fifth collection of songs from Torontonian Howard Gladstone. An emblematic album, embracing the tradition of the troubadour and the philosophy of the searcher, Hourglass flows with flourishes of insight and romantic imagery.
Songs dedicated to love, wandering and the constant yearning homeward are set in a simple landscape of bass and guitar, with occasional tints of drums and whatever instruments finger wiz Tony Quarrington can lay his hands on.
There is a gentle hush and quaver to Howard`s voice that sometimes verges on narration, reminiscent of the restraint of David Bromberg . But it soon becomes evident that this is essentially a “duets“ album, as the assured steadiness of Laura Fernandez`s low-key chanting continually pulls the flutter of Howard’s voice back from the situational precipice of his lyrics.
“Got so high, and pushed back down, got skid marks on my back.“ – The Road Is Me
Laura Fernandez, Howard Gladstone, Tony Quarrington
The rolling ease of the instrumentalists keeps an even path for Gladstone`s allusive episodes of travel and epiphany. Crystalline shine from the melodic expertise of Mr. Quarrington and bassist George Koller brightens Seven Years To The Day and a choral rallying on closer Still Got So Long To Go extends the arc of Howard`s voyage into the future.
The effervescent energy of the whole ensemble brings to life Mr. Gladstone`s affectionate memories and his calm reminders of the sands swirling through every moment and floating down to rest.
INTERVIEW about “HOURGLASS”
Five Questions With Howard Gladstone, from Canadian Beats, 2017
Care to introduce yourself to our readers?
I’m Howard Gladstone, a Toronto-based singer/songwriter. I am just releasing my fifth album, Hourglass, after a hiatus of several years due to spinal cord injury that I have mostly overcome. I have had a life-long interest in literature, and a background in journalism, and previously owned and operated a boutique manufacturing business in Toronto. I’m still active in a smaller company I started in the audio industry. But now I consider myself a full-time musician and have the time to concentrate on it. I’m working with a partner to launch a new record label, Sonic Peach Music, with an emphasis on high-resolution music.
Tell us a bit about your music and writing style.
My music could be categorized as “contemporary folk” in the tradition of the singer/songwriters of the 1960’s onwards, such as Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Van Morrison. I have both a poetic and lyrical style, as well as writing the occasional topical song. I place a strong emphasis on lyrics and finding the right combination of melody and lyric to create the mood of the song.
To be successful in my opinion, a song needs to create a mood, tell a story, paint a picture or express an emotion. I bring diverse musical elements into my songs – rock, folk, blues, jazz, progressive pop – and try to create something new and unique in every song. I feel if songs are to have lasting power, they need to rise above the ordinary and mundane and reveal something to the listener. And do it with beauty, precision, and style.
Do you have any upcoming shows? For someone who has yet to see you live, how would you explain your live performance?
My next show is Thursday, October 5 at Hugh’s Room Live in Toronto, to celebrate the release of my 5th album, Hourglass. It is my most important and I feel my best work, released 3 1/2 years after I suffered a spinal cord injury. So it is a sort of comeback. For me, the theme of the evening is the power of music in healing. On this album, and for the show, I will have Laura Fernandez singing duets and backup, guitar ace Tony Quarrington, and bassist Russ Boswell. It will be an intimate and powerful evening – at least that’s the plan.
If you were asked to suggest only one of your songs for someone to hear, which would it be?
The opening track on my new album, Hourglass, is called “My Heart Won’t Let Me Keep Still.” It sets the tone for the album – resolution in the face of difficulty, healing through the power of love. It features the two acoustic guitars that pervade the album, and lovely vocal harmonies by Laura Fernandez It can be heard on ReverbNation, SoundCloud, Bandcamp via links on my website.
Canadian Beats is all about Canadian music, so who are your current favourite Canadian bands/ artists?
I have great admiration for those performers who keep at it and am very impressed lately by Buffy Ste. Marie and Bruce Cockburn – two great creative wells of energy who continue to produce great work. Jon Brooks is an amazing songwriter and raspy vocalist; but his tough subject matter probably means he won’t be mainstream, ever. Ariana Gillis is an amazing young singer/songwriter who has just released a new album. I like the intimacy of the acoustic musician where one can hear deep into the soul of the music and the artist.
