Shawn Mullins - Beautiful Wreck, Beautiful Soul

Nothing is a  more pleasant experience than to stumble upon something that can move you in many ways. Serendipity, I think, is what it's called. A serendipitous discovery is what I would consider my introduction to Shawn Mullins' music. It was late '90s and grunge, which sustained me during college years, has lost its appeal  on Generation X. Gradually, the angst-filled lyrics and the incessant riffing became a thing of the past. So I was in auditory limbo, so to speak, when one day I was listening to the now-defunct NU 107 station and this raspy voice threaded through the airwaves half talking, half singing a jaded view of Hollywood. Nothing new about the subject; it's formulaic, but with the husky voice and gentler guitar accompaniment it was a welcomed novelty for me. 

The song was Lullaby, and it was the song that catapulted Mullins from the whiskey-soaked bars and Chinese restaurants into  the mainstream music scene. It was by sheer luck that many days after I got hooked on Mullins my brother, who's been working abroad, brought home with him  Soul's Core, a 14-track album which includes Lullaby.  Apparently my brother had enough of John Fogerty and The Eagles that he'd turned to Mullins too. LOL.

The songs Twin Rocks, Oregon and  Anchored In You instantly appealed to me. With his sometimes melancholy, sometimes congenial voice (you can actually hear his smile), great guitar playing and lyrical simplicity he moved me.  Certainly, he didn't need evocative phrases to accomplish that.  In Anchored In You, which could be his torch song in the album, he simply laments "I'm stoned in San Francisco with you on my mind".

Twin Rocks, Oregon is a poignant piece, probably his autobiographical anthem. Singing in first person as he often does,  Mullins talks about a vagrant artist possibly not unlike himself when he started his musical journey. He begins with "I met him on the cliffs of Twin Rocks, Oregon" then continues describing the man who "had a bottle of Mad Dog he held in his hand/That he waved around a lot to make his point."  The two talk over a shared joint about their shared experience, particularly the frustrations that come in the way in pursuit of one's passion ("I don't reckon I'll be makin' it big/You know it's hard to get rich off a tout of coffee house gigs"), and then their version of vindication (And he said yeah, but ain't it a blessin' to do what you wanna do).

Mullins' visage looks like his voice and music - gritty, with uncompromising lines, and looking like life has thrown some punches  his way. Beautiful wreck is how I would describe it,  to borrow the title of one of his more recent songs, and I kinda like it.  I mean this guy's got a soul for life and for his music that you got to embrace everything about him.