#4: “When I Turn Ninety-Nine” by Devin Davis
The only things I know about Devin Davis are a few sentences on Wikipedia and the bio page of his web site (the new version of which is supposed to launch promptly three years ago). Basically all of the above amounts to this: he’s from Chicago and 2005′s Lonely People of the World, Unite! is his first and only album.
You can learn much more about Devin listening to the lyrics of his record, which are all about loneliness, fantasy, loneliness, desperation, hope, and loneliness. That said, Lonely People of the World, Unite! is one of the least sad albums you’ll ever hear. It’s 35 minutes of perfect power-pop energy, and a masterpiece. Yes, I’m dropping the M bomb. It’s a masterpiece that Devin wrote, performed, produced, and recorded entirely by himself, in isolation.
I first heard of Devin back in 2005 when Salon.com recommended a free download of the opening track, “Iron Woman,” which I listened to mostly because the reviewer claimed Davis’s vocal energy to have “Springsteenian gusto” (entirely true). I liked the track enough to order the CD, which Devin sent me himself with a handwritten thank-you note. Since then I’ve listened to the album over and over and over, and I’m still unable to find a single thing wrong with it1. I love Devin’s lonely-nerd wail and his wailing guitar and his yearning lyrical wails (“If I owned me a car I’d drive it so fast that they’d throw me in jail”) and his, uh, wailingly perfect production which among other things manages to morph a closing drum solo into a live recording of a sky full of fireworks.
For the past several months, I’ve been a guy sitting at home alone trying to get someone to pay attention to my work and wondering if I’m fooling myself into thinking I’ve got talent. So Devin’s album inspires me, and it should inspire any artist out there. This one guy working alone and not knowing if anyone would ever hear him created something perfect on his first try. If he can do it, so can we. It’s a Van Gogh story. Five years later, Lonely People is still an unknown classic and Devin hasn’t been heard from since a MySpace blog post in 2008.2 So listen to the song, and if you like it buy his music and spread the word.
I picked the album’s second track, “When I Turn Ninety-Nine,” because it’s a rocker with broad appeal, and because I once had a sitcom in development that, if it had made it into production, would’ve used this for its theme song.
Devin, if you’re out there: nice work. Keep at it. Please.
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Buy It:
It’s a calculated risk to buy Lonely People of the World, Unite! through Devin’s languishing site, but feel free to give it a try.3 You can, with confidence, order Lonely People of the World, Unite! through Devin’s languishing site. Otherwise, a couple of fellow lonely people have used copies listed on Amazon.
Devin’s Live at Shubas album is available both on iTunes and eMusic, though it doesn’t capture him at his best.4 A much surer bet is his lovely ballad “When the Angels Lift Our Eyelids in the Morning,” which opens Kill Rock Stars’ compilation Sound the Hare Heard. It’s available as a download on both eMusic and Amazon.
VERY EXCITING UPDATE!
I’ve had this post sitting around for quite a while, and I just looked at Devin’s site and MySpace page for the first time since I originally wrote it. Two very exciting things have happened since then. Devin posted this message on his site:
“Hey there! I’m still working on the new album… I am going to finish it! For real! Hopefully in time for the holidays…”
And he updated his MySpace blog to note that his song “Turtle and the Flightless Bird” was featured in an episode of Jersey Shore of all fucking things.
EVEN MORE EXCITING UPDATE!
I got a very nice email from Devin the other day. He had a couple of important news items: 1) He’s still hard at work on his new album. 2) It is indeed safe to buy his CD from his web site; he’ll quickly fill any orders. 3) He concurs that Live at Schubas is a disaster and “a f*ing scam” and wishes it were wiped from the Internet. Go forth and buy his CD!
