Dalton Alexander - At Some Point It Stopped

A Closer Listen

Dalton Alexander has carved out a comfortable sonic niche in which music and field recordings intertwine and the memories of childhood are specific and sharp. Endearing tracks have included “Requiem for Rubber Bands” and “Scholastic Book Fair,” sparking a tactile nostalgia.  The same holds true on At Some Point It Stopped, in particular “Halloween Lawn Decorations” and “That One Field Trip to the Planetarium,” which serve as reminders of a childhood autumn, concrete experiences returned to life.

If Almost Home If I’m Still Alive is Alexander’s spring set and I Wonder How Many Are Still Alive represents summer, then At Some Point It Stopped is a mini-album for fall.  We love recordings that are released during their time, and to hear “Sad October Music” in October seems just perfect.  Water flows, friends converse, a guitar gently weeps.  While this is not particularly sad – the track in fact includes laughter – it does sound melancholic, as by late October even the hardiest of folks must admit that the warm days are over, replaced by a different kind of warmth.  The fact that this leads into “Halloween Lawn Decorations” is no accident, as the latter track provides something to look forward to; one hears the thickness of the evening before the music even begins, a soft drone with crickets as guest instrumentalists.

Those crickets also appear on the opening track, along with owls, an autumn ecosystem echoing through the speakers.  One morning the birds are all a-twitter, the next we see flocks migrating south, along with hordes of human retirees.  The change is gradual, but there is a tipping point, somewhere between pumpkin spice lattes and candy corn, when one realizes it has occurred. Banjo, piano and glockenspiel make “Fell in a Hole, Rolled Out of Morning” a gentle wakeup, a bridge between seasons and days.

The title track is even more autumnal, a quiet ode to endings and implied beginnings.  In “That One Field Trip to the Planetarium,” our entire concept of time is expanded, the wonder of the. stars and the down-to-earth memories of the hush before the show, the surreptitious whispering, the crush whose hand we held or wanted to hold, the fast-food stop on the way back.  Childhood wasn’t all that good, and it wasn’t all that bad; while listening to this music, it all rushes back.  Alexander’s strength is that of association; his memories spark ours, and help us to embrace this new season with a newfound wistfulness, borne on the backs of all the autumns before.  (Richard Allen)