Travel agents worldwide have long speculated as to why Canada suffers from such an anemic tourist industry. After all, the country is absolutely gorgeous, rich in natural resources, and offers the best health care system known to man. How could anyone stay away from the place? Well, you see, Canada is plagued by what we in the business call "sameness." Yes, its true that each respective city is built from a different ilk of lumber, and that wayward ice flows occasionally interrupt daily life, but there's simply not enough topographic diversity to warrant the bursting tourist industry Canadians so desire. Similar criticisms can be made of uninspired music, which often finds an artist reiterating a particular sonic trick one time too many.
Which is why its painful to call the music of Greg Davis uninspired. The kid's certainly got some talent and originality up his sleeve, but no matter how many subtle variations in accompaniment garnish Arbor, his debut for New York's Carpark label, its songs tend to bleed into one another like those indistinguishable Canadian territories.
Music critics will revel in such horrible headliners as "Múm's the Word" or "Aphex's Twin" when reviewing Arbor. The latter being a catch-all, a last resort for any and all electronic music artists to have the unfortunate role of being reviewed by an unimaginative writer. While it's true that Davis and Múm both conjure up glitchy meditations of very similar moods, Davis' instrumentation is confined to his laptop, guitar, and the occasional sampling of an iconic folk legend. And though he does manages to explore a fair amount of sonic territory in spite of this, there's not enough compositional diversity to sustain repeated listens.
But Arbor isn't without its merits. The opening track alone, "Submersion Tank Part One (V.2)," justifies the record's release and makes for a gorgeous introduction into Greg's world of escapist musical montage. Here-- and nearly everywhere else on the album-- he employs deftly struck vibraphones, small flourishes of muted white noise, and the occasional interjection of computer-generated beeping as foundation for his valium-induced haze of sound. Elsewhere, the album's title track finds Greg plucking out a desperate and unadorned acoustic melody for nearly nine minutes. And in fact, the song manages to remain engaging for the majority of its duration.
Yet, at other moments, Davis' experiments fall short. "Nicholas" is the worst offender here. It samples the fragile refrain of Nick Drake's "Introduction" before mutating into a big beat-cum-IDM number and dousing Drake's original material in gauzy phaser effects. Though it does lend the album some much-needed diversity, its pandering and derivative performance is awfully weak, making "Nicholas" an awkward inclusion on an otherwise decidedly down-tempo affair.
Regardless of its flaws, Arbor pulls off a rare feat: a promising debut. In fact, Davis' more concentrated efforts often rival-- and occasionally better-- his contemporaries, based purely on originality. But until his tendency to wander aimlessly about is firmly inhibited, I'd wait on investing my hard-earned money in his music.
