The kid can sing.
23-year-old Winston Yellen, better known as Night Beds, possesses a voice of tremulous, outstanding beauty. It’s something he is highly aware of, that much is evident. For on debut album ‘Country Sleep‘, when Yellen unleashes his vocal gymnastics of heartbreaking vulnerability over lashings of rumbling Americana, he holds nothing back.
Hailing from the comparably culturally deficient Colorado Springs, the formative Night Beds migrated east to Nashville, entered the heart of America’s alt-country scene and took up residence in none other than Johnny Cash’s former abode. It was here, in the company of the ghosts and atmosphere of rock and roll history that Yellen’s music was formulated and his extraordinary voice refined.
The result then, finds Yellen with supreme confidence in his greatest asset, so much so that ‘Country Sleep’ opens with ‘Faithful Heights’, a startling a capella shiver of a song. There’s no trusty troubadour guitar in sight, it’s just the naked voice coated in long-tailed reverb washes, and as he delivers the opening couplet, “When sorrow calls, and you don’t know why”, it instantly becomes obvious that Yellen has read the Americana manual from start to finish and from back to front: the album ahead documents Yellen’s alcohol-laced longing for life’s lost loves.
By the time the textbook titled second song ‘Ramona’ kicks in, all the elements that make up the constituent parts of Night Beds’ vocals suddenly reveal themselves with the clarity of freshly polished crystal. Imagine a group therapy session in the company of Ryan Adams, Bon Iver and Robin Pecknold and you’re not too far away. And that encompasses the music of all three too, for ‘Ramona’ is an acoustic strum through alt-country’s dust laden highways; trembling guitar flourishes and a diversion into high-harmonies, strings and pedal steel. Judging by the success of the aforementioned triumvirate, more songs like this from Night Beds could see him becoming something quite special indeed.
Another example of Night Beds channeling the American greats (or Canadian in this case) is found on ‘Borrowed Time’, where Yellen effortlessly glides a round peg into a round hole on the Broken Arrow Ranch, creating a delicate acoustic slow dance lament that wouldn’t be out of place on one of Neil Young’s albums, ‘Harvest Moon‘ in particular.
The album marries its folk leaning with a hint of some Daniel Lanois-esque, atmospheric production values best found on Emmylou Harris’ 1995 album ‘Wrecking Ball‘ – albeit ‘Country Sleep’ is nowhere near as saturated. Here the voice is pushed to the forefront and the dynamics are subtler, such as on the brooding single ‘Even If We Try’. Barely there piano underpins Yellen’s quest for him and his estranged other to, “Make ourselves alright, to mend our severed lies” before sweeping strings of melancholy drench the song to its core.
There’s maybe a touch of Bright Eyes present at the start of ‘22’. A lower key vocal perhaps the root cause of this conveyance and before too long the song explodes with – once again – some soaring strings, one of the strongest features of the album throughout. Yellen also lowers his register on ‘Cherry Blossoms’, a woozy, dream-like drone over a handful of simple chords, somewhat Midlake-ian until Yellen seems to jolt out of the warmth of a cosy slumber, almost as if he is remembering that he’s right in he middle of a song, then hits the vocal gymnastics button to put his own stamp on it.
As expected, there a one or two moments where he doesn’t manage to keep his standards to such highs, but if on upcoming releases Night Beds can provide the consistency that is the hallmark of say, Fleet Foxes albums, then his future is a bright one. Something says ‘Country Sleep’ is aching for that killer track, or maybe a few that would really boost the album as a whole, but there’s talent here, that much is certain.
So ‘Country Sleep’ is a sad album, with a theme that’s been done ad infinitum, and there is the worry that an extended player from someone so young could come across as simply wet and mopey, causing the listener to think ‘oh just bloody well pull yourself together’. However, that is categorically not the case here. It successfully targets the universality of its subject – after all it’s a subject that most in the world can relate to and empathise with. For example, on paper the lyrics of ‘Was I For You’ may seem rather blunt, naïve and simplistic: “Was I for you? I’m still for you, I’m all for you in my heart”, but by setting them against the synth and string quartet combo of its coda, Night Beds brings them to life. Lyrically, Bob Dylan he ain’t but musically, Yellen certainly knows what he’s doing.
On debut albums, many artists are only making baby steps, learning the ropes in full public view as they go along. With ‘Country Sleep’, Night Beds is already beginning to run.
Maybe soon he’ll fly, and catch up with that soaring voice of his.
