It has been a long seven years but at last, the talented and prolific Dale Murray has finally released Dream Mountain Dream, his wonderful new record that should resonate with fans of George Harrison and Brian Wilson.
The record serves as Murray’s second solo release, following his 2005 solo debut. Of course, Murray has been anything but idle over the past seven years.
In addition to having spent time working with east coast musicians like Molly Thomason and Steven Bowers, Murray spent a significant chunk of time playing with acclaimed rock band Cuff The Duke. In August 2011, Murray stepped away from Cuff The Duke, choosing to focus his energies on working with others in addition to his solo work.
Dale Murray and his wife, talented and acclaimed musician Christina Martin, will be performing at the Bridge Street Café in Sackville tomorrow evening at 7 p.m. Admission to the show is free.
Looking back on the last seven years, Murray expresses no regrets about there being such a long span of time between records.
“Right after I released my solo record in 2005, I had joined Cuff The Duke, which kept me on the road for several months every year,” Murray explains. “I find it very difficult to write on the road, so I wasn’t coming up with a whole lot of material. And because Cuff took up so much of my time I just decided to focus my creativity on that band for that period of time. But during that time, I was also learning to produce and engineer albums while I had time away from the road, which also took up a lot of my attention. Working with other people on their music has always been my focus so I wasn’t overly concerned about not producing my own music.”
Asked about the influence that his work with others might have had on the direction of Dream Mountain Dream, Murray says that it is somewhat inevitable that his work with others would end up directly or indirectly influencing his own material.
“Working with other people is the best way progress as a musician, but I have found it is more gaining experience than learning specific things from certain musicians or bands. When I listen to Dream Mountain Dream and stack it up against my debut, I hear the musical experience that I have gained over the past seven years of working with others.”
Murray says that while a couple of the tracks featured on Dream Mountain Dream are “years old”, he says the bulk of the record was written approximately one year ago when he and Martin moved into their farm house in Port Howe, N.S. He says that he had intended to start up a studio after having left Cuff The Duke and as such, testing out his recording gear with his own material seemed like a logical step.
“After I left Cuff The Duke, I started wanting to record again so I figured that recording an album of my own material was the best thing to do at that time. I had started writing music again and within a couple of months, I had an album worth of songs,” Murray says.
Joining Murray for his performance on Saturday evening is his wife, Christina Martin, a much-respected musician in her own right. Recorded by Martin and Murray at their home, Martin is anticipating a summer release for her new record Sleeping With A Stranger, the follow-up effort to her excellent 2010 record I Can Too. She anticipates divulging more details with respect to her upcoming record towards the start of May.
Though working with your significant other could be trying to many people, Martin says that she and Murray work very well together which she feels helps strengthen their relationship.
“We work really well together and that relationship keeps getting stronger,” Martin says. “We both have strengths to bring to the table, goals and a common vision for our work overall. Technically speaking, Dale is stronger than I am, but I feel that I am stronger lyrically, but we both bring lyrics and melody to the table. If we ever do face differences in opinion, we are pretty good at sorting things out without breaking anything.”
Article published in April 27, 2012 edition of the Times & Transcript