Album Details

• Artist: Dan Zimmerman
• Album: Cosmic Patriot
• Label: Sounds Familyre
• Year of Release: 2009
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: patchen on 2009-05-01

Zimmerman's gruff, Waits meet Cave meets Cohen vocals add an air of witness to the tunes here. "Cosmic Patriot" is the kind of record fill of questing spirituality, cynicism and dark sexuality that is common to those gods; but Dan Zimmerman is his own man. This is a powerful, adventurous, uncompromising statement by an artist whose raw honesty and musical daring is compelling and reassuring. Yes, there are artists like him still around.

"Silence Is A Golden Mountain," as well as "Lonely Way," are defiant but optimistic songs driven by pop hooks, while "Secret Name" and "Steady Plodder" have a slower, semi-gospel feel to them. Zimmerman is also not afraid to flip his wig. "The Thing Itself" is a slow distorted drone that allows for some brooding time.

In all, "Cosmic Patriot" is the kind of record you will be returning to for years, and each listen will be rewarding for deeper and deeper reasons. I'm giving this a classic rating, and I've only heard it four or five times. This is a keeper; the record took six years to complete, and Dan Zimmerman is getting on in years, but however long it took these songs to gestate, they revealed themselves as diamonds.

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