Kristian Matsson is not the figure you would expect to take up the stage name The Tallest Man on Earth, but when this petite Swedish singer opens his mouth, you get it.
With a quiet confidence and solidarity, he carries through with open guitar notes and restlessness in his voice, and there has always been something so beautiful about Matsson and his minimalist albums.
Now, three years after the release of his last album (There’s No Leaving Now), Matsson, the deeply passionate and poignant Folk singer, has broken the silence with his fourth studio album entitled “Dark Bird is Home.”
Unlike his previous work, Matsson steps outside the isolation of his own voice and guitar to include a more diverse array of instruments, opening up his music, and perhaps divulging a new side of the singer/songwriter to his audience.
This fuller sound is prevalent from the opening track, “Fields of Our Home” when halfway through the somber song, a strumming guitar is accompanied by an ensemble of strings and Matsson’s voice meets the sound of another to break the seclusion.
There are still traces of his old self found in this album, but Matsson doesn’t separate the new from the old. His album weaves into a seamless stream of flowing rivers that find their way to a deep ocean of sound and musical arrangement.
Matsson is first and foremost a storyteller in this album, as he always has been. With “Dark Bird is Home” he gives us glimmers of his life and universal moments that speak to the weary and wanderlust.
There are moments of joy, sorrow, simplicity and the complex. Matsson’s lyrics dance between opposites and fall anywhere from the doorsteps of one’s home to the shoes’ of a traveler, though neither feels out of place.
Matsson is very honest with his lyrics and he delivers each verse and melody so genuinely. No line is felt more deeply than those found in the sixth track “Sagres.”
Matsson sings almost exasperated, “It’s not me knowing there’s a deeper in the dust no, it’s not the reasoning with shadows that are gone no, it’s not me knowing I’m yet to see fire, it’s just all this fucking doubt…”
Almost immediately Matsson changes gears from the doubtful “Sagres” and falls into the comfort of “Beginners.” He ends his albums somewhere in the in-between, and it’s Matsson’s ability to weave in songs of opposites that this album shines.
Through all the changes, though, we still have the same charming artist, maybe a little disheveled, but still optimistic and open.
Matsson lets us know with “Dark Bird is Home” that despite trials and uncertainty, “this is not the end, no this is fine.”
Essential tracks: “Singers,” “Sagres,” Timothy and “Dark Bird is Home”
Release Date: May 12
Source:: The Tallest Man on Earth New Album “Dark Bird is Home”