Broken Folks

The first album in eight years from Candle Records graduate Anthony Atkinson is worth savouring, writes DOUG WALLEN.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] Melbourne schoolteacher Anthony Atkinson makes loping indie pop with a moral compass. His previous album – 2006’s Loyalty Songs – dealt in anthemic, polished build-ups (‘She Let Him In’, ‘Sunday Drives’) as well as in nagging concerns both moral (‘Believer’s Ledge’) and political (‘The Bleeding Hearts Are Back’). Eight years later, Broken Folks does the same, even going as far as to include a glossary defining political terms like “backbencher” and “labour stats” that get dropped in the lyrics. Atkinson himself admitted that “there’s obvious socio-political point-scoring going on” in the standout ‘It Radiates’, and yet it’s done subtly enough not to undermine the song’s insistent catchiness.

Like other graduates from the now shuttered Candle Records school (see also: Darren Hanlon), Atkinson specialises in songs that can work independently as warm-hearted pop (if you don’t pay such close attention to the words) and surprisingly frank commentary (if you do). That sense of having it both ways is more palpable than ever here, thanks to the sparkling, Johnny Marr-esque collision of Chris Baker’s pedal steel and Louis Richter’s lead guitar, not to mention robust ensemble backing that piles on horns, vocal harmonies and other generous layering. The opening ‘I Lost My Way, I Found a Friend’ achieves such a satisfying climax – complete with crashing cymbals – that the lyrical subtleties take a relative backseat.

Atkinson can seem all too mild-mannered at first, plying folk-tinged guitar-pop that might appeal to fans of Belle & Sebastian and Augie March. But as with those two bands, there are a fair few unsettling moments in these songs. “And the elective surgery that changed your identity started playing on your mind,” he sings on ‘Into Night Again’, while on ‘Calm & Collected’ he actually pleads to be seen as mild-mannered rather than how he actually is: “Please believe me when I say I’m even-tempered.” On the worker’s lament ‘Labour Day’, he envisions an employee who’s almost comically downtrodden: “You went to mass just in case they heard you pray.” Whether quipping about “The small home truths in the polling booths/of the public schools with the most to lose” on ‘It Radiates’ or “old faded charts drawn by hopeful men looking to the stars” on ‘Trade Winds’, Atkinson complicates his seemingly innocuous songs with quietly pointed turns for anyone willing to listen that much more closely.

“Reaffirms Atkinson’s knack for spinning everyday difficulties into elegant wordplay.”

There’s such a comfortable, genial quality here that the songs can blur together on the first few listens. But there are defining details that soon arise to set each one apart, from the way Atkinson’s uncharacteristically jaunty vocal delivery evokes Dexy’s Midnight Runners on ‘The Lake’ (although within the band they joke that it’s closer to Rod Stewart) to Baker’s banjo and a back-and-forth duet with Atkinson’s former Mabels bandmate Kimba Mitchell on ‘Some Border Town’. The through line across Broken Folks, apart from the clarity of his vocals and the ringing affection of the backing band, is a tug of melancholy even when the music is aglow with seeming cheer. “And the sentimental melodies that once brought you to your knees/Haven’t really worked this time,” he sings on ‘Into the Night Again’, with the wisdom of someone who knows firsthand.

Actually, the whole album can be boiled down to the closing, a cappella title track, which reaffirms Atkinson’s knack for spinning everyday human difficulties into elegant, almost tongue-twisting wordplay: “Broken folks everywhere, making molehills out of mountains of despair.” And that’s just the first line.

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‘Broken Folks’ is out now on CD and digitally through Lost & Lonesome. Read Atkinson’s Track by Track. The full band will play two free sets this Saturday (Dec 6) from 5 to 7pm at the Union Hotel in Brunswick; more info here.