Danger Mouse is well known for his prolific output, both as a producer and an artist. In the past few years alone he’s worked with Beck, Gorrilaz, MF DOOM, The Black Keys, Martina Topley-Bird and The Good, The Bad and The Queen, as well as releasing a number of albums with Cee-Lo, his partner in Gnarls Berkley. More recently Brian Burton – to use his given name – has been concentrating on Broken Bells with James Mercer from The Shins, and has stated in numerous interviews that this latest project will take up all his energy for the foreseeable future.
Even with all his focus placed firmly on Broken Bells, there will still be new Danger Mouse release available shortly, the slightly delayed and highly anticipated ‘Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse present: The Dark Night of the Soul’. Originally the album was due for a release last year, but mysterious wranglings with various record labels meant any kind of official release was looking unlikely. These have seemingly been straightened out, as the album is out early next month and is already winning rave reviews.
Perhaps the most striking thing about the album is the roll call of artists involved: Gruff Rhys, Julian Casablancas, Iggy Pop, Frank Black, Suzanne Vega, Nina Persson, The Flaming Lips and Vic Chestnut are amongst those to contribute, and legendary director David Lynch has created a book containing hundreds of photos that act as a visual accompaniment to the album. Lynch’s involvement in the project is indicative of the watt Burton looks upon his career. He once told a journalist “I want to create a director’s role within music, I have to be in control of the project I’m doing. I can create different kinds of musical worlds, but the artist needs the desire to go into that world… Musically, there is no one who has the career I want. That’s why I have to use film directors as a model”
Having already won rave reviews prior to the original intended release, the album still being hailed by critics; one journalist wrote “Few contemporary pop albums have spoken to the human condition so eloquently, and given the listener so much pleasure in the process”. Even with such plaudits, the album’s release is made all the more pertinent with the recent passing of two of its contributors. Mark Linkous, the principle and only permanent member of Sparklehorse, took his life in March after a lifetime spent battling depression. He was a huge influence on Radiohead, with whom he toured in the mid-Nineties. Colin Greenwood said of Linkous “Mark wrote and played some beautiful music, and we’re lucky to have it. His first two records were very important to me, and I carried his music into my life, and my friends’ lives too.”
Vic Chestnut, the iconic singer and poet who appears on the albums penultimate track, was a prolific artist who despite being paralysed from the neck down released well over a dozen albums and appeared in two films (the first a documentary on his own life). Like Linkous, Chestnut was a quiet influence on a whole generation of artists, as was proven by 1986’s Sweet Relief compilation, which featured R.E.M, Madonna, Kristen Hirsch and Sparklehorse covering his songs. He died last December whilst in a coma, brought on by an overdose of muscle relaxants.
Dark Night of the Soul is out in July, for more information visit the website.


