Following numerous European jaunts, tours with The Walkmen, The Decemberists and Okkervil River, playing for Wills & Kate on their recent trip to Canada, award nominations and appearances at Glastonbury and End of the Road, Dan Mangan has joined City Slang. The Vancouver-based song smith will be releasing his captivating new album ‘Oh Fortune’ in the UK on December 5th.
You can download and hear ‘Post War Blues’ here:
Already a highly regarded Polaris Prize nominee in his home land, his mark on the UK thus far has been fleeting but impressively well received and the release of this new record a statement of intent. Ambitious and textured, ‘Oh Fortune’ sees Mangan pull away from the world of alt-folk, observational anthems that its predecessor ‘Nice, Nice, Very Nice’ encapsulated, allowing the music to swell up into waves of full orchestration and with the help of free-jazz experimentalists and Seattle’s Eyvind Kang arrangements developed into luscious walls of sound, sweeping and flowing throughout the album.
‘Post War Blues’ is the perfect introduction to the album, and proves that Mangan has much more to give than ‘Nice, Nice, Very Nice’ suggested.
Despite the change in direction, ‘Oh Fortune’ never strays far from what Mangan believes is ultimately “him”.
“The last record did far more than I or anyone else thought it would… I felt like we stumbled by accident onto something that people liked. I feel now that if we tried to recreate something that already worked, I wouldn’t like it… and then they wouldn’t like it either,” Dan muses, “it has to be sincere, and relevant, and whatever we’re feeling right now.”
Anthemic calls to arms such as ‘Post War Blues’ and ‘How Darwinian’ do just that. Reflecting how Mangan is feeling now, and continuing the themes of isolation and desperation that are raised by tracks such as ‘Rows of Houses’, the rich instrumentation and the positivity of the album’s title spawned from Dan’s reflection of a ticker‐tape parade in the US in 1926 balance out the morbid streams of thought.
‘Oh Fortune’ debates melancholy while it anticipates incredible moments of glory and victory, as the title’s background suggests. It’s not sad, it’s simply honest. Life is just that.
