March 19, 2012

The Buckley Legacy - Fall from Grace

So here we are, with our ongoing, somehow Father's Day celebration, The Buckleys' Legacy. Being the second part of this rendition on the "father/son duo", if you haven't read RRR's post on Tim Buckley, go ahead and read it, if you please.

Like RRR said, I won't go into much detail on Jeff Buckley's life and career (Google and Wikipedia are your friends), but rather tell a short story and write about the astounding ability of this iconic singer, guitarrist and songwriter.

Jeff Buckley - Fall From Grace


From the start, "Scotty" grew in a rich musical environment always singing alongside his mother and introduced by his stepfather - at an early age - to bands like The Who, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd. It was only at the age of 8 that "Scotty" met - the first and only time - his father, Tim Buckley. Due to drug overdose, his father passed away at a very young age and ever since, "Scotty" became the well-known Jeff Buckley. It was at the age of 12, that Jeff decided to follow his father's footsteps and went on to become a musician. As his first steps in the music industry, Jeff played in a tribute concert to his father and that was his last respects to him, since he wasn't able to attend to his funeral nor been able to tell his father anything.

And so began the musical journey of this Mistery White Boy, but on a completly different style, genre and music dimension of his father.

Jeff Buckley had a somewhat special way of writing songs, as he would prefer the small bars as to "irritate or entertain the people" that were listening to the performances of his "yet to come" songs. In fact, some of these performances are shown in records and bootlegs and in all of them, it is amazing to hear his vocal ability. He has a very unique way of singing, hell to be honest, it's his most distinguished aspect, as he ranges from a very soothing, lullaby-ish medium-low voice into a piercing, arrow-like high voice, but always strong, soulful and heartfelt. You can hear it in a number of songs from his 94' Grace album, such as Mojo Pin, So Real or Grace.


The Grace album is a treat in many ways, as it shows his ability to write classy meaningful lyrics, like Dream Brother or Last Goodbye, harmony rich songs with guitars somewhat complex in their chord choices and arrangments (like the lovely Lilac Wine)...


...his "long bow" versatile voice styling and vibrato are, of course, present and finally, his ability to perform and put his heart, soul and personal touch into cover songs, like his well acclaimed Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah rendition. In a less technical point of view - I apologize for that - this whole record can be either somewhat romantic or a mellow, heart-braking experience; whatever mood fits your tastings. Bottom line, and this may be biased - but I really don't care - Grace is really worth listening and enjoying every minute of it.


Sadly, and like his father, this story ends in disaster. On the same day that his band was flying over to Memphis Tennessee to record the now called Sketches to My Sweetheart the Drunk, Jeff Buckley died at a young age of 31, from an accidental drowning in the Wolf River Harbor, leaving behind a legacy and a legion of fans of his astounding work.

I end this Father Day's celebration with one of my favorite songs, Dream Brother. It is a very dynamic song, as it goes from a soothing hymn to a full on in your face energy, as the band pours their hearts and souls out.
Although this song was originally written and dedicated to a friend of Jeff Buckley, in my opinion it kind of resembles the (lack of) relation between Jeff and Tim:

Don't be like the one who made me so old (Tim)
Don't be like the one who left behind his name (Jeff)
Cuz they're waiting for you, like I've waited for mine
And nobody ever came (Jeff/Tim)

Maybe it's farfetched, maybe I'm overthinking, but it has similarities with the little story that was shown here.
Also, this is a somewhat special song as it was the first song I heard of Jeff Buckley and it was presented to me by a (then) great friend of mine who I was very fond of. This video is live and it shows a great performance of him and his band.



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