Review Summary: It's them they know, not me.
From the late 1960's to the early part of the 1970's, Western popular music found itself imbued with an onslaught of new folk artists, attempting to carry on the legacy of individuals like Dylan and Baez while simultaneously removing some of the genre's more politically oriented elements. However, as much as this was a major step forward for folk music being accepted by the layman, it was arguably an even larger step backwards for the genre's artistic merit, particularly when it came to the whole "album" concept. While Dylan had been able to create works such as
Highway 61 Revisited, where every track is essential to the album's well-being in some way, this new wave of folk artists was far more singles-driven, treating the album as a collection of singles and supporting filler tracks. This didn't completely neuter the material these artists wrote, but it made it all a fair bit more commercially viable than artistically interesting, leading to far more "Carolina in My Mind"s and less "Canadian Railroad Trilogy"s. For those who enjoy that sort of thing, it's all well and good, but I doubt the majority of us would prefer having more John Denvers over more Nick Drakes.
To anyone who hasn't heard his music, Cat Stevens fits this sort of "vanilla folk" artist moniker as well as anyone else. A burgeoning English pop star in the late 60's, Stevens had a few top 10 hits in the UK singles chart and released two albums before disappearing from music for two years following a battle with tuberculosis that would nearly kill him. Superficially looking at the material he's released since would simply offer the notion that he was able to return to music, release a few more hits, then eventually retire as he sought spiritual comfort in the religion of Islam (of which he remains a member to this day). This, of course, is a gross oversimplification of things: Stevens's convalescence caused him to rethink and question every aspect of his life, including his spirituality and, indeed, his music itself. When he returned to recording (having written 40 or so songs during his time away), Stevens aimed for a much more self-aware, grounded sound that embraced the growing folk-rock trends of the day. This manifested itself in Stevens's third album,
Mona Bone Jakon, a far more mature record than either of its predecessors in terms of sound and lyrical content. While it's a bit too inconsistent overall to be considered a "great" album on its own merit, it provides a strong foundation for the even more focused work that was to follow immediately afterwards.
For being recorded as soon as it was after
Mona Bone Jakon, and despite consisting of songs written during the same stretch of time as those on its predecessor,
Tea for the Tillerman manages to avoid the curse of being a carbon copy or a rip-off in any way. The demeanor on this album is much calmer; while
Mona Bone still has a bit of desperation to it, as if Stevens is worried the points he's making aren't clicking with his audience,
Tillerman is confident with what it's trying to say. The album deals with two running themes throughout its runtime: the preservation of innocence, and the road to spiritual understanding. No explicit connection between the two is ever made, but the themes are interspersed so well in the running order that it works as a coherent piece anyways. Hell, one could argue that
Tillerman is very much a portrait of Stevens himself after his illness, along with the numerous internal struggles he was dealing with at the tim. Certainly this interpretation would make the spirituality and innocence themes coalesce very cleanly with one another.
The tracks that deal with questions of spirituality are very clear in their messages; "Miles from Nowhere" expresses his determination to find so-called "enlightenment" even if it leaves him feeling unfulfilled for the foreseeable future, and "On the Road to Find Out" catalogs his desperate quest to find purpose in life before realizing the answer lies not in the outside world, but rather in introspection. The innocence themes are more varied in terms of how they can be interpreted, however. Certainly the sentiments of "Wild World" are blatant, spoken from the perspective of a parental figure cautioning a young woman to be careful as she enters the real world. And I don't believe having the wistful "Sad Lisa" come immediately afterwards in the tracklisting was any sort of a coincidence; like the female character of "Wild World", the character of Lisa is portrayed to be very innocent, but also very isolated in this case, as if she's been traumatized by a terrible experience and is refusing any sort of outside aid because of it. Not only does it make sense for those two characters to be one and the same, but it could very well be that Lisa is the aforementioned representation of Stevens himself, torn apart by outside forces and attempting to come to terms with what pieces he has left.
Even if this interpretation is incorrect and
Tillerman isn't any sort of a retelling of Stevens's post-illness struggles, the intimacy it portrays is still remarkable. The production can be thanked in part for this; former Yardbirds bassist Paul Samwell-Smith does a remarkable job of getting crystal-clear, even sound quality in a variety of instrumental situations, with Stevens utilizing everything from a barrage of guitar/drum/vocal overdubs to simply a solo vocal/solo guitar mix. But indeed, it's Stevens himself who steals the show, not just with his incredibly tasteful guitar-playing and excellent songwriting, but with his vocals. It's rare to find a folk artist who can carry a song with their vocals alone, but Stevens has a certain way of managing the dynamics of songs exceptionally well. He can play up the innocence of his voice on tracks like the aforementioned "Sad Lisa" or "Into White" (a candidate for the most beautiful and most underrated song in his discography), but when a song calls for desperation and/or raw emotion (such as "Miles from Nowhere")), he delivers with a visceral passion that would rival many a soul singer.
Cat's finest moments (and, not-so-coincidentally, the finest songs on the album) are the occasions when he can show off both sides of his voice. The opener "Where Do the Children Play?" combines a skeptical, questioning lyric with a steadily intensifying vocal delivery that culminates with Stevens letting everything loose on the final chorus. But it's the penultimate number that truly stands out from the rest. "Father and Son" has him playing two roles vocally: the role of a father who is attempting to prevent his son from making rash decisions, and the role of the son who is sick of others controlling his life and wants to forge his own path in life. It's the sheer excellence in the execution of this contrast (both in the vocals and in the surrounding arrangements; the backing vocal counter-melody in the final verse pairing is chill-inducing) that makes the song Stevens's finest moment as an artist, and, dare I say it, one of the most emotional songs you'll likely ever hear.
Tea for the Tillerman is likely not an album that will hit everybody in the same way it has hit me. I was first exposed to this album at a particularly emotional time in my life, and the combination of uncertainty and hope in the lyrical content as well as the musical arrangements just struck a chord in a way that almost no other albums have. As such, every bit of technical analysis that you read here is essentially a roundabout method of saying that this album touched me deeply and on a more personal level than I can comfortably describe. But to be fair: what is there to criticize about the execution of this record? Even the weakest songs on
Tillerman contain more genuine heart and soul than most folk songs of the time, and it certainly comes nowhere close to falling into the "love song" cliches that James Taylor and his ilk were promoting. At its worst, it's harmless, innocent fun, and if you're able to get fully immersed in the album's beauty, the result could end up being one of the most rewarding experiences you will have as a music listener. I speak from experience myself, and if this review can turn even just one more person onto this album in the way that I was, my work as a music reviewer has been accomplished.
