Description
Dart to the Heart is the 18th studio album by Canadian singer, songwriter, and guitarist Bruce Cockburn, released on True North Records in 1994. The album was recorded March 1993 by Joe Schipp at Bearsville Studios in Bearsville, New York; with T-Bone Burnett producing. Mixed by Glyn Johns at Warnham Lodge Farm in West Sussex, England. All songs written by Bruce Cockburn. Featuring “Closer To The Light”, a song written by Bruce Cockburn in memory of the late American singer/songwriter Mark Heard.
After umpteen albums, when dealing with Canadian folk/rock artist Bruce Cockburn, it’s a lot the way it is with Bob Dylan; it’s easy to take his genius for granted. The major difference being that, while Dylan has chosen to make idiosyncratic records and perform in a way that challenges his listeners to guess which song he’s mumbling, Cockburn continues to write literate, accessible songs that both honor his past works, while continuing to make vital and relevant, personal art. By now, there are enough fans that have dug back into Cockburn’s classic releases of spiritual enlightenment, his left-wing political forays, and his even better works that seem to bind it all together with a cord to real life mundanities, that recounting his twenty-plus year musical history would either be redundant or irrelevant.
lf you are completely familiar with Cockburn’s musical sojourn, then you’ll be comforted to know that this latest work, ‘Dart to the Heart’, stands along side his best, perhaps recalling best the tone of ‘Further Adventures Of…‘ with its sprite acoustic guitar solos and up-tempo tales of relational love and spiritual encouragement. If you’re unfamiliar you’ll want to know that his name is pronounced Coe-burn, so you don’t make a fool of yourself at the CD store. Now, you’ll just have to catch up on your own time.
‘Dart to the Heart’ is the second of Bruce Cockburn’s albums produced directly for Columbia by T Bone Burnett. While again, Cockburn is surprisingly forthright about his faith, connecting it – as it is always best to do – to the real stuff of his life, there is less musical tension. Where ‘Nothing But a Burning Light‘ had several tracks where Cockburn strained his voice and struggled to expand musical boundaries, here he’s settled in to the comfortable shoes of past triumphs and focuses creative grasp on lyrical depth and musical beauty.
At times warmly familiar – «All the Ways I Want You» sounds like a lighter, less-sad, acoustic rewrite of «Coldest Night of the Year» – Cockburn is at easy and the sound of his bright acoustic guitar stylings and familiar vocal rattle truly connect. «Bone In My Ear» and «Scanning these Crowds», not unlike «Rumours of Glory», finds the sacred in the common, while elsewhere he affirms the journey through dark periods in life and «Closer to the Light».
«Burden of the Angel/Beast» takes yet another crack at explaining the human reality, made by God for life but torn between a higher calling and a near-animal nature. Without sliding into psychobabble, Cockburn poetically and, I think, correctly recognizes that sin feeds on our self-esteem. Behind it all Cockburn has learned to «Listen for the Laugh (of Love)», where «Love Loves You Too» roots the created in the Creator. It’s at times a tiring, burdensome life, and Cockburn finds solace in the «Southland of the Heart», where there is rest, a musical amplification of the biblical concept of shalom.
With Bruce Cockburn, the depth and emotional impact of his work affects this reviewer on a personal level. The compelling blend of a sensible spirituality, an honest political purposefulness, and deep poetic insight in songs of musical release make his art thoroughly compelling. His work here, on ‘Dart to the Heart’, connects to the best instincts of his early works, more so than many of his latest of the last decade, and many of them are quite good. Cockburn’s music has always been for me more than a good, enjoyable listen; his albums have often created a safe haven like the one he sings about in «Southland of the Heart». Each new effort, each trip backward and forward, adds significantly to that legacy and makes meaning – out of the necessity of getting older. [Brian Q. Newcomb, Syndicate Magazine, July 1994, Vol. 9, Issue 2]
> Apple Music (https://music.apple.com/us/album/dart-to-the-heart/902046459)
CD tracklist:
01. Listen For The Laugh – 4:07
02. All The Ways I Want You – 4:21
03. Bone In My Ear – 3:47
04. Burden Of The Angel / Beast – 6:31
05. Scanning These Crowds – 3:51
06. Southland Of The Heart – 4:50
07. Train In The Rain (Instrumental) – 3:44
08. Someone I Used To Love – 3:35
09. Love Loves You Too – 4:14
10. Sunrise On The Mississippi (Instrumental) – 3:01
11. Closer To The Light – 4:11
12. Tie Me At The Crossroads – 2:50
Note: Simultaneously released on cassette, minidisc, and CD by True North Records. Available at Bandcamp: https://brucecockburn.bandcamp.com/album/dart-to-the-heart
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