End of the Middle

Album review

Over the past two decades, Richard Dawson has established his unique songwriting voice with some core consistent qualities. He builds his songs around simple repeating guitar parts, with lyrical narratives defining their structure and development. These melodies and stories form repeating sections—often with alternating parts that function as unconventional verses and choruses—that stretch to lengths beyond conventional rock songs. 

Dawson's vocals display impressive dexterity, alternating between a reedy, speech-like tenor and a higher register for melodic sections.  While "Knot" features bombastic drumming and distorted guitar, most of End of the Middle surrounds Dawson's unique writing and singing with sparer arrangements. 

His impressive storytelling, which attracts devoted fans who memorize these complex narratives and sing along at his concerts, is highly detailed.  Opener "Bolt" is the tale of a house being struck by lightning that begins with the context of mundane activities: "I'm in the hall on the phone/ Jen's in her room watching neighbors." Once lightning strikes, the wordplay gains a richness ("Cacophony of barking dog and burglar alarm/ A scorch mark in the center of my trembling palm") and the guitar and drums build in intensity to match the obvious stress in the home. "Boxing Day Sales" places the narrator and his friend under a store's awning on a frigid December day. A phrase in his conversation turns into a slant rhyme: "Are things any better between you and Tom/ I'm so tired of hearing these awful Christmas songs."

Final track "More than real" leaps from the conventions that precede it. A keyboard replaces the guitar in creating the song's structure and tonality, and it's an unexpected duet between Dawson and Sally Pilkington's female voice. Where many of his songs end quickly, this one has an extended instrumental coda to bring End of the Middle to a natural close. © Steve Silverstein/Qobuz