Side 1
1. The Cowardly Traveller Pays His Toll 6:56
2. Oxygen 4:48
3. Parachute 3:56
4. New Year’s Song 4:02
5. Two Friends Take A Bow For The Record 6:50

Side 2
1. When Will The Sun Rise Again 7:12
2. Born Of Longing 5:16
3. I Wrote A Song About The Ocean 4:36
4. Disappear From Here 7:47

It is hard to write about Nebraskan singer-songwriter Simon Joyner without making reference to two very obvious influences: Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan. If I was to work out ratios, I’d say that his music is 7 parts Cohen to 3 parts Dylan, although nods to the latter are often more explicit. The packaging of Joyner’s 1998 double LP ‘Yesterday, Tomorrow, And In Between’ is a direct pastiche of ‘Blonde On Blonde’ (gatefold sleeve with ¾ length portrait on outside, black and white photos on inside; 4 songs on first two sides, 5 songs on side three, one long song on side four. It even shares that album’s electric sonic clatter). If this Dylan-referencing wasn’t enough, he later put out a single entitled ‘The Motorcycle Accident’. You could be forgiven for thinking he is just one of countless acoustic poetic miserablists ploughing this particular furrow. What then makes him so special? John Peel seemed to know. So taken was he with Joyner’s 1994 LP ‘The Cowardly Traveller Pays His Toll’ that on one of his shows he gave it the rare accolade of playing the whole thing from start to finish. I remember when the British label Wurlitzer Jukebox put out the ‘One For The Catholic Girls’ single in 1998, Peel commented that at last somebody had had the good sense to release something by Simon Joyner in the UK. Joyner went on to record two Peel Sessions, the second of which Peel sadly didn’t live to hear. What I like about Simon Joyner, aside from his way with words and the timeless simplicity of his melodies, is the beautifully raw and unaffected nature of his recordings. Where so many Dylan disciples sound strident and overbearing, Joyner displays a welcome fragility and humility (borne out by the name of his publishing company: ‘Simon Joyner Is Not Important’). And, fine as his songs are, there is a sense that he is not overly precious about them. His LPs (the early ones at least) seem to have been recorded without worrying about such cosmetic details as noise reduction or tuning up. When the singer has a tendency to sing so gloriously out of tune, why worry whether all the instruments are perfectly in pitch with each other?

Simon Joyner has released something like 16 LPs to date and my own collection runs to fewer than half of these. But as his music has a bleakness that provides a perfect soundtrack to the depths of winter, 1997’s ‘Songs For The New Year’ seems as good a recommendation as any. I also have a slight obsession with title tracks that are on the wrong album, and here things kick off with a song entitled ‘The Cowardly Traveller Pays His Toll’, sharing its name with the infamous ‘Peel Incident’ LP of 3 years earlier. Joyner’s strummed acoustic guitar is joined for the intro by a beginner pianist practising his arpeggios, alongside a mournful cello, and tape hiss. The mood is slow and stumbling, like a worn-out Leonard Cohen record, although Joyner’s higher vocal range gives it a flavour of its own. The somewhat sinister lyric comes from the point of view of a man urging his ex-lover to drive away without looking back — but just who is the ‘toll-taker at the end of the turnpike’ with ‘murder in his eyes’? Not that Joyner invests such lyrics with any drama. This isn’t Nick Cave. Simon Joyner can (and frequently does) get biblical with the best of them, but he’s not going to preach. Likewise the musicians keep things nicely underplayed, adding extra colour without overwhelming the songs. The drums are barely audible on track two (‘Oxygen’), while on the third track ‘Parachute’ they provide little fills while someone plays bits of pizzicatto on a violin. ‘It’s a new year’ sings Joyner on the pedal steel-inflected ‘New Year’s Song’, but it sounds more like a complaint than a celebration, especially when he concludes: ‘What time does it end/And when can I go/Get into that car/And drive through the snow?’ A harmonium adds warmth to the slow waltz ‘Two Friends Take A Bow For The Record’. These two friends appear to be anticipating the end of something momentous. Or perhaps just the end of side one. Side two kicks off with something relatively anthemic. If Leonard Cohen had written ‘When Will The Sun Rise Again’ it would be considered one of his classics. In the wrong hands it could have become overblown, but Joyner’s naturally pained voice makes it deeply affecting. With its old-timey harmonium chords and whistled coda it is the highlight of the album. ‘Born Of Longing’ is another waltz with a hint of ‘Norwegian Wood’ via ‘Fourth Time Around’. ‘I Wrote A Song About The Ocean’ plods along to out-of-tune piano chords and ‘Disappear From Here’ is a protracted solo performance which keeps adding another verse just as it appears to be stumbling to a conclusion. Again, very Dylanesque, but Simon Joyner is working within a genre that has traditions to maintain. And with a voice like his there is no other tradition which would have had him.

‘Songs For The New Year’ has an austerity that makes it the perfect palate-cleanser after the season of over-indulgence, as plain and natural as the apple Simon Joyner is eating on the front cover. Like Joyner in the picture, you may end up picking bits of skin out of your teeth, but as new year’s resolutions go this is one healthy option you may find unexpectedly pleasurable.