Daniel Talton is a songwriter from Los Angeles who works in a traditional style of folk music. 2017 saw the release of his debut album, Daniel, a collection of songs conjured from the dusty country aesthetic, and drew too on the stranger side of the genre. Next to tales of late nights and painful mornings was something uncanny, the arcane and decidedly American spirit where loneliness and landscape collide with prophets and preachers, a millenarian yet intimately personal story of just another life.
In preparation of the release of a brand new EP, Daniel Talton is back with the single ‘Master’s Cave’. Concerning both the act of losing and the state of being lost, the track is subdued and quietly devastating. Barely rising beyond a murmur, Talton’s vocals sound like words mouthed to oneself when alone, the tick of guitar slow and casual and near improvised. A song not written and rewritten and edited down but one that emerges naturally, like emotions manifest as sound.
Described as “an abstract visual collage of tunnels and thresholds, found in the Los Angeles National Forest,” the video was shot by Talton himself on 16mm film using a Bolex H16. The result is every bit as evocative as the song, worn by time and haunted by light leaks and imperfections. But most of all the footage captures something of the modest beauty of Talton’s music, the quiet power of things both organic and man-made presented side by side.
You can find Daniel Talton on Bandcamp, so keep your eyes peeled for more news about the forthcoming EP.