Hi, everyone. Dissthony Tracktano here, the internet's busiest music nerd. It's time for a review of this new Richard Dawson album, End of the Middle.

Here we have the newest full-length LP from UK-based singer and songwriter, Mr. Richard Dawson. It has been a few years since we have heard a nice, proper solo full length from this one-of-a-kind artist. And given his lengthy, impressive, daring, and body of work so far, going into this new album, it's hard to say what I was expecting. Definitely something eccentric or at the very least conceptual.

As far as singer, songwriters, and folk artists go, while I wouldn't necessarily call Richard Dawson's work as outsider as somebody as, let's say, Daniel Johnston, Richard definitely challenges on numerous fronts what our preconceptions of what a singer or songwriter should or could be, whether it be through his cacophonous and raw recordings or his ambitious song concepts, all the progressive song structures and instrumentation. Really dense narratives, too. Records like 2020 as well as Magic Bridge and his previous major one The Ruby Cord, are proof that he is truly a one-of-one type of artist, for better or for worse. Because I know his particular brand of storytelling and oddball falsettos aren't necessarily going to be for everybody, especially when he's serving up dystopian dirges or let's say a 41-minute opening track.

However, I think End of the Middle over here is actually one of Richard's more straightforward, more no-muss, no-fuss type albums. It's not too heavy or difficult to untangle in terms of instrumentation and topics. Song lengths too for the most part. For the first time in a long time, I feel like Richard's stuff is sounding surprisingly accessible and approachable. I mean, don't get me wrong, I do think the appeal of this record in 2025 is still going to be at least a bit niche. But given the various guitar lines and harmonious chord changes all over a track like "Gondola", for example, this is something I could see fans of a band like Grizzly Bear appreciating.

Plus, there's also a slow core appeal, I would say, to moments like the opening track, given all the patient and stark guitar passages that paint its verses. Maybe a bit too stark and skeletal, though, at times, the guitar tones and vocals and drums throughout the entirety of this album, save for a few moments, are very bare. Some of the only comparison points I can think of are earlier in Richard's catalog or, I don't know, maybe something like from a duo such as The Evens, because you really do have so many dry guitars and vocal performances all over this album.

Similarly, save for a few spots here and there where you get a surprise reed solo popping in, which does add a really nice amount of color to this record. But yeah, with the sound being as bare as it is, maybe the most gripping thing about this album is its storytelling.

Now, Richard, historically, is no stranger to singing from a variety of different perspectives across an entire album. That is also the case here. But I guess this is the first time all the stories on a particular record are all sounding super modern, normal. In terms of the settings that they happen in, there's also a big thematic focus on family. Richard, lyrically, doesn't take the heartwarming angles and approaches that you might presume, given this topic.

The song "Gondola", for example, is a bit of a slice of life story about a man who's leading a regrettable life. He says he wishes he had gone into higher education. He's filling in for his dad at the jewelry shop, feeling somewhat inadequate in comparison to, presumably, a more successful and smarter sibling.

Moving on to the song "Bullies". This track is about exactly that, but there is a bit of a narrative twist to this one as we start with a story about somebody who is dealing with being bullied in school as a child who then grows up to have a son who he finds to be fighting and scrapping at school himself when he is a parent. Then the question is a really interesting mix of a childhood tale, a bit of sleep walking, a ghost story, too. It's easily one of the most enthralling narratives on the entire record. Some of the folksy melodies that paint this tale are very pretty, too.

But I will say this is definitely one instance on the album where the instrumentation, being as bare as it is, prevents some of the more grand and theatrical passages and performance pockets of the song from really resonating and I think feeling as powerful as they could have. Still, I do love Richard at the end of the song, embodying the spirit that he's singing about on the track, asking the question, Where are you going? Where are you going?

The song "Knot" features a bunch of bleak observations made in the midst of a wedding. Like a lot of other things on this album, a situation that is typically portrayed as being this beautiful, moving, life-changing event, is instead explored as something that is annoying and cringe and a bit of a sensory nightmare as the main character makes it clear that he is emotionally feeling numb and not really up to going to this whole thing and just eating a bunch of snacks and sucking at karaoke.

In a lot of ways, this album just deals in a lot of regular, normal everyday types of experiences, but just explores them or paints them in a way that is very dour. Again, I like the idea of this. I like the lyrical and narrative angles that are being taken. It's just that sometimes the music is so bare and so raw and so lofi that I feel like it takes away from the theatrics and the performances a little bit. I think a few of the tracks being as long and winding as they are, aren't exactly helped by this.

There are a few cuts, especially the singles, that I feel like go against this grain a bit and are quite direct by Richard Dawson standards, maybe a little hookier than you might expect, be that "Boxing Day Sales" or "Polytunnel", the latter of which contributes to a few tracks on the back half that actually bring a bit of a ray of light into this album. Some positive vibes, as it were, as this track is really a poetic and very endearing ode to gardening.

Following this, we do also have some other positive resolutions on "Removals Van", which portrays a very transitionary period in a particular family's life where the parents are aging, the father is let go, but they're also moving into a new place happening and a baby on the way. Again, it's very slice of life. It's a very honest and humble and earnest portrayal of these things. It's not wholly good, it's not wholly bad. It's just the average everyday things that happen to families as they are growing and changing and shifting thing. The sorts of details and changes and shocking surprises and sometimes lows that you're not always getting in something like a Hallmark movie.

Continuing with that theme, we have the closing track, which, considering all of the instrumentation and all of the mixes prior, is surprisingly synthy and spacey. There's almost like some Magnetic Fields vibes coming off this track. This is an instrumental palette that I wouldn't really mind hearing Richard explore more on songs into the future. It's a very confessional moment lyrically, that ties up a lot of the album's themes around family and especially cycles and patterns of behavior that are thrust upon you by family, be that through learned behavior or DNA or I don't know, just fate. There's also a portion of this tale that is very much about older generations dying as you're becoming the adult or the man of the house or the patriarch, I suppose. There's also an element of this track about losing loved ones and healing and moving beyond that. We get some beautiful guest vocals from Sally Pilkington as well, who has collaborated with Richard in the past many a time, especially in their sideband, Hen Ogledd.

But yeah, while I didn't come away from this record wowed or awed or blown away in the way that I have been by some of Richard's previous works, I'm not exactly sure if he was going for something that was really going to just amaze fans this time around. I think he intentionally created a record that was very subtle, very low-key, very humble. I think that's a prime word. Humble is a word that I would use to describe this album in terms of the topics and the stories being dealt in, the way the music matches that as well.

It's almost like Richard on this record is embracing a certain averageness as a means of sonically and musically depicting the stories that are being told here in order to communicate this idea that the experiences and the feelings that are being discussed on this record, these are things a lot of people go through, pretty much everybody to one degree or another. Growing, aging, dying, raising kids, coming into your your own. And also moving through those sometimes scary once-in-a-lifetime experiences that are beyond words or unexplainable or just happen because it's just due to stuff out of your control.

I like that Richard was able to pull all of this off on a record that, again, while I may not be as enamored with it as some of his other releases, comes across as just very straightforward, very direct, very earnest, very sincere, and very thoughtful, too, which is why I'm feeling about a decent to a strong 7 on it.

Anthony Fantano, Richard Dawson, Forever.