Deeper Water
The title song of Paul Kelly's brilliantDeeper Waterbegins with a childhood memory of being carried in his father's strong arms above the crashing waves of the Indian Ocean. A folkish, nostalgic arpeggio is played on an electric guitar as the verse gives way to the hymn-like chorus, "Deeper water, deeper water, calling him on." To this point, the song has the well-crafted, country-folk feel of a John Hiatt family number, but then it falls apart. The pretty folk arrangement is overtaken by a disorienting, Lou Reed-ish guitar riff as if the singer had dropped into a bottomless sea, and Kelly describes the analogous experience of falling in love with a woman only to watch her waste away from disease. He sings the fetching melody of the chorus in the same deadpan tone, but now it has a very different connotation. It would seem nearly impossible to capture the tuneful domesticity of Hiatt's work and the droning nightmares of Reed's on the same album--much less the same song--but Australia's Paul Kelly is an extraordinary songwriter and singer. Kelly has had a few hits and exerts lots of influence at home in the antipodes, but he's little more than a rumor in North America, despite releasing six of his 11 albums here, of which this is among the best. He foregoes the obvious gestures of pop music for insinuating rhythms and unassuming melodies which sneak up on the listener and slowly but surely seep in. This understated approach fits his lyrics, which are too aware of the paradoxes and gray areas of adult relationships to deliver simple answers to familiar questions. The album, recorded in Melbourne with Kelly's current Australian band, is full of hints at anger, lust, giddiness and sadness lurking behind the low-key craft of Kelly's rootsy bar-band music.--Geoffrey Himes