Listening Party: John Edgerton and John Scoggin

Here’s the gimmick: Each week, we’ll pick two local bands — an opening act and a headliner — link to a site where you can listen to their songs for free, then ask you to spend a few moments of your precious time to tell us what you think about them. Some may be great, others may be mediocre or awful — that’s for you to decide — all we ask is that you listen with an open mind.

Opening Act: John Edgerton

Armed with the humble tools of the troubador — a voice, a guitar and his own words spinning a simple tale — the modern day solo folk artist, the singer/songwriter, should instantly strike a brave, almost heroic, image. Here is the lone creative spirit holding fast against an ever-growing, ever-churning multimedia sea, hoping to make landfall in a tiny boat built sturdy of the oak of personal truth. Right?

Well, kind of. You see, instead of that solitary figure as a dot on the sea, it’s more like a flotilla — or perhaps an armada — of musicians. And instead of being seen as soul-bearing individuals, from a distance they all look more-or-less the same. That same acoustic guitar, that same overlong lyrical narrative, that same lack of dynamic arrangement or emotionally powerful vocals. In short, most singer/songwriters, though no specific fault of their own, tend to blur together.

Which brings me to John Edgerton, a perfectly talented solo folk artist who is a victim of being lost in a sea of similar-sounding performers.

His songs are melodically simple, rarely going outside of a well-established and well-played chord structure. There are little embellishments here and there, but nothing particularly memorable. In fact, the melodies are self-similar enough that it’s somewhat difficult to distinguish the songs from one another if you can’t hear the lyrics clearly.

His voice is perfectly serviceable for the genre, but I can’t say there’s anything specifically striking about it. It’s not a particularly emotional voice, so it doesn’t add much to his music on the whole. I don’t want to give the impression that his voice is bad — it’s more than suitable for what he’s doing with it — but rather that it’s clearly not the focus of his music.

Which brings us to the one thing that must be good in order for any singer/songwriter to have any kind of credibility with their audience: The lyrics. And, rightly, it’s here that Edgerton’s music is at its strongest. While I won’t say that it borders on poetry or anything, these songs are clearly about specific subjects, and reflect both a keen eye for observation and a healthy degree of personal insight. Which is vital, because people who are drawn to solo acoustic performers tend to want to be told a story far more than they want something to dance to.

Here’s an example from the song “Sparrow” …

Do you dream to find
the meaning tattooed to your mind?
What do you become there that is free?
Is it only mist and misery?

We’re as lazy as an eye,
gazing on the bluest sky
above the sand is shifted by the sea
What’ll you become love, without me?

Cause I will become a word
I will become a sparrow
And a song I’ve never heard
will be my arrow

Set against a relatively simple melody and sung in a relatively uninflected voice, these lyrics hold the entire weight of the song. And, I’m happy to report, that they bear the load quite well. Of course, I’m tempted to hear what these songs would sound like as performed by someone with a truly powerful, emotive voice and backed by a well-arranged band, but I can’t judge or criticize Edgerton’s music based on that fantasy. As long as his lyrics are strong, his music stands well enough on its own.

Headliner: John Scoggin

From what I can tell, it’s a bit deceptive to imply that “John Scoggin and The Cold Roses” — as Scoggin’s MySpace page claims — is anything other than a solo recording project with high hopes of becoming a band. That’s not a bad thing at all — in fact, it means I can directly compare his work to the standards set forth for the opening act — but I felt it needed to be addressed right out front.

Interestingly, Edgerton and Scoggin are both part of the same musical scene of local singer/songwriters, performing regularly at the Sunday Songwriters’ Showcase at Sonny’s Brick Oven Pizza. But it’s there that the two performers cease to have anything much in common.

Scoggin’s songs have a melodic richness and complexity that goes beyond the self-limiting three-chord standard that folk music tends to adhere to. You can tell instantly that — in his minds eye — Scoggin doesn’t hear these songs as being defined by a solo guitar. In recording them, he’s layered the vocals and the guitars as one would with a band, making for a far more interesting listening experience.

What’s more, he has a clear sense of the importance of dynamic sound — that quiet/loud thing that defines the “modern” movement of post-rock folk music — which makes his songs feel that much more emotionally resonant and personally urgent. These songs feel like rough drafts of bigger, deeper works rather than simple folk tunes. And, as long as you view them as sketches of songs yet to be perfected, they’re really quite compelling pieces of music. A good example of this is the track “(A Country Song) For You.”

Of course, Scoggin’s voice isn’t something amazing on its own terms, but he does know how to use it to communicate emotional content. Folk purists would probably argue that he’s not singing in a particularly folk style, which I’d readily agree with. Nor should he, largely because the traditional folk style is — to be completely candid — typically dull and dry to the modern listener’s ear. Scoggin, meanwhile, is clearly singing in the rock-influenced pop-folk style, which — while it does tend to muddy the lyrics a little — also doesn’t make anyone who doesn’t worship at the altar of James Taylor nod off halfway through the tune.

This pop-folk style is actually well-suited to Scoggin’s talents, although at times it seems like he’d rather be playing in an alt-country influenced indie-rock band as much as doing the solo acoustic performer thing.

But what about that last leg of the singer/songwriter’s tripod? How good are Scoggin’s lyrics?

In the context of singer/songwriter tunes, they’re actually a bit on the simple side and occasionally veer into being formulaic. They lack the narrative depth and layers you’d expect from someone who takes their artistic credibility from being a storyteller first and foremost.

But, in the context of someone who is essentially writing pop music and performing it in a solo acoustic setting — which I believe to be the case with Scoggin — his lyrics are relatively good. Not particularly deep, I’d argue, but certainly effective when combined with his melodic and vocal strengths. Here’s an example from the song “Under My Skin” …

I will never say those words again
I know that words can’t only break when people bend
This time we’ve seen the end again
I know it’s harder to live when you pretend

That’s why tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight I walk away
I will leave, I will leave, I will leave
Before you can’t stay

Tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight I walk away
I will leave, I will leave, I will leave
Before you can stray

While it may seem like I’m comparing apples to oranges here with these two artists, please keep in mind that both perform on the same stages to the same crowds, and in the exact same context. We have two men playing solo acoustic guitar — sharing many details, even down to their first names — and yet the two are clearly different in almost every relevant musical respect. Here is the diversity of style and intention that makes a local music scene thrive, and both deserve ample credit for contributing to it.

Now, it’s your turn. I’ve put my views out here on the digital page, but you can correct, amend, disagree, refute and rebut any and all of it by commenting in the field below. Notice something about the bands that I missed? Write a comment. I’ve had my say, now it’s all about you.