Video Premiere: David James Allen “Another Day Older”

Here’s the latest release from Toronto’s David James Allen.  There are gorgeous layers and textures that give ‘Another Day Older’ captivating depth, especially the string arrangement from Jillian Sauerteig.  Over the rich and rhythmic instrumentation, Allen’s voice carries an easy and engaging melody.  Though the song is bright and tuneful, Allen’s theme is the danger of hard living; Allen’s lyrics are intriguing and he was inspired by the poets Al Purdy and Nelson Ball: “I used to feel excited when I woke // Then all this numbness came and I awoke broke.”  Reinforcing the song’s title and subject matter, the video was filmed over the course of several weeks and you can see Allen change over time.  Like Allen’s music, it’s subtle and smartly done.

The single is taken from the forthcoming album ‘By the Summertime’, which is due on 9th June.  This will be Allen’s fourth solo album and the follow up to 2022’s ‘The Architect’, an intriguing album that explored the theme of imposter syndrome.  Allen has been releasing music for a decade but, over the last five years, he has been particularly prolific, a period that coincides with leaving Toronto and settling in the more isolated Prince Edward County.  He says of the new record: “After I’d finished ‘The Architect’, I found myself in an unexpected position of needing to make another record within a specific time frame, and that’s basically how ‘By The Summertime’ came to be.  My first instinct was to dive in to old notebooks and hard drives for past ideas, but of the 10 songs on the album, only two came out of that. I ultimately decided to use a clean slate for the rest. I’d never really approached an album that way before, and it made the writing process really exciting, especially given my deadline. I would be jotting ideas down constantly during breaks at work and demo-ing them at night.  I wanted to try some different writing styles, steeped more in poetry and stream of consciousness writing, as opposed to character driven narratives.  That blended with the more open and free musical approach I wanted to take, stemming from my recent interest in learning how to play guitar in a more jazzy style.”  

Check out the album – finely crafted songs from a talented writer.  Enjoy.