Death comes to Dannyland

Deeply human ruminations and dark laughter emanate from mystery man Danny Cohen.

By Will York

I DECIDED THIS year-end piece was going to be about Danny Cohen well before the apocalypse theme was announced, and despite the tempting Armageddon-heavy metal connections, I'm sticking with my original plan. As it happens, it's a pretty good fit. Cohen's most recent album, released this past spring on the Epitaph sublabel Anti-, is titled We're All Gunna Die. Not only that, there's a song called "Funeral in New Orleans" (although it's about voodoo, not hurricanes) and another one, "Mystery Man," name-checks Nostradamus in its chorus. Are these cosmic coincidences, or merely ordinary ones?

Whatever the case, We're All Gunna Die is not strictly about the end of the world, or even about death, although the latter theme does figure prominently. The album is dedicated to violinist Jimmy Borsdorf, who died during the recording sessions, and the cover features a painting of Cohen strumming his guitar next to his own tombstone. But like last year's equally compelling (and overlooked) Dannyland (also on Anti-), WAGD isn't one-note doom-and-gloom by any means. Cohen's songs mix regret, horror, nostalgia, and flat-out depression with a sense of absurdity and black humor. There are even fleeting moments of joy and contentment, as on the beautiful opener, "As I Looked Down." WAGD is the kind of emotionally complex, deeply human record that could only be made by someone who's lived, loved, lost, and felt it all too deeply for his own good – yet somehow still retained the ability to laugh at himself in his darkest moments. One of the songs on Dannyland is called "Enlightened Despondency (E.D.)," which sums up Cohen's worldview pretty well.

I've been pulling for Cohen for years, ever since I came across his Museum of Dannys CD, part of the Tzadik label's Lunatic Fringe series, in 1999. That was the year I moved to San Francisco, and Museum, with its loner vibe and seedy SF local color, was a mainstay during my early months in the city. That I identified so closely with someone branded, however affectionately, as a lunatic, didn't faze me – the fact that almost no one seemed to notice the album bothered me more. Then there was the time I showed up at Doc's Clock to see Cohen perform and found the place packed to the gills, only to see it empty out in a matter of minutes when news spread that rumored guest Tom Waits was actually a couple blocks down at Bruno's, watching his longtime bassist (and Danny's brother), Greg Cohen, play instead. I felt awful and had to personally beg Danny Cohen to play more songs, as he was convinced that there was absolutely no one interested.

I've seen bits of praise for Cohen in the past couple of years, but not nearly at the level I hoped for as he made the jump to Anti- (which, unlike Tzadik, actually promotes its records). Most of the press I have seen has invoked the dreaded "outsider" tag, which is often a euphemism for "a little bit nuts" – as if Cohen's just some weirdo fortysomething (or fiftysomething?) who emerged from out of nowhere and isn't self-aware enough to really know what he's doing.

Well, he wrote, arranged, and produced (under the pseudonym Erroll Sprague) all of WAGD, and despite the off-the-cuff feel of many of the songs, there are some quietly stunning arrangements, such as "Magritte," with its haze of accordion, French horn, Mellotron, and weepy lap-steel guitar. Reviewers who hear Waits in Cohen's music are probably right, but my hunch is they've got the lineage backward – that Cohen's earlier, privately circulated tapes influenced the creative left-turn Waits took with 1983's Swordfishtrombones and 1985's Rain Dogs (both Island).

Why is any of this relevant? I hear a longing sense of "what if" and, again, regret in Cohen's music – as if life, or at least recognition for his songwriting talents, has passed him by. It's probably why he relates to his own tragic characters, such as the protagonist of WAGD's "Cousin Guy," an underachieving lost soul whose loserish exploits rival those of the main character in Frederick Exley's depresso-masterpiece novel A Fan's Notes. The lyrics are a little awkward in spots, but Cohen's delivery oozes pathos like nothing I've heard in years.

The tombstone inscription on WAGD's cover is telling: "I have run all the gauntlets, and lived the mean of my years." Cohen can joke about it, but I hope that he's wrong and that he's able withstand a few more gauntlets and continue releasing his music for years to come.

Will York's top 13 musical moments in 2005

1. Danny Cohen, We're All Gunna Die (Anti-)

2. Zip Code Rapists live at the Hemlock Tavern, July 31, 2005

3. Eyehategod with Jesse Quattro live at Cyclone Warehouse, Nov. 19, 2005

4. Tim Berne's Hard Cell, Feign (Screwgun)

5. The Jack Nitzsche Story: Hearing Is Believing: 1962-1979 (Ace)

6. Alvarius B, Blood Operatives of the Barium Sunset (Abduction)

7. Funkadelic's Westbound catalog, 1970-1975 (reissued on Ace)

8. Sir Millard Mulch, How to Sell the Whole F#@!ing Universe to Everybody ... Once and for All! (Mimicry)

9. Daiquiri, "Life Ruiner," Babies Making Babies (Kharbe)

10. Soilent Green, Confrontation (Relapse)

11. Various artists, Guitars of the Golden Triangle: Folk and Pop Music of Myanmar (Burma) Vol. 2 (Sublime Frequencies)

12. Fiona Apple, Extraordinary Machine (Epic) and bootleg version

13. Orthrelm, Ov (Ipecac)