I’ve had ’The Happiness Project’ by Charles Spearin for a good while but have never really given it the listen it deserves until recently. Spearin, a multi-instrumentalist member of bands such as Broken Social Scene and Do Make Say Think, uses sound clips of people talking to produce a strangely fascinating album exploring the ‘musicality’ of spoken word.
Each song uses different parts of interviews Spearing conducted with his neighbours in downtown Toronto. Different instruments and notes are used to compliment the mood or mimic the sound of the voices and a song is produced. A diverse range of people are sampled, from the noisy little girl shouting at her mother in “Ondine”, the deaf “Vanessa” to the sentimental tale from the immigrant “Mr Gowrie”.
It’s hard to explain exactly why the listen is so compelling, which is perhaps the reason I sat on the album so long before writing about it. The interviews are both interesting and affecting and the concept is weird and unique (at least to me). Give it a go and see what you think. Others seem to agree, The Happiness Project won the best contemporary jazz prize at the 2010 Juno awards (The Canadian version of the Grammys).
The album is available to buy from Arts & Crafts and is available on Spotify for you listening pleasure.