This coming week, hundreds of Canadians are planning on doing something dramatic or unusual at the behest of Stephen Lewis. Dozens have volunteered to take the plunge into a dangerous environment, such as a stand up comedy club, or an apiary, and Toronto rapper K-Os will even return to his old job at the toy department in The Bay, but the big news on campus is that second-year U of T student Daniel Gray will brave the unseasonable cold to play catchy, thick-layered pop music on street corners around the city.
The Dare to Remember Campaign is an organized event started by Stephen Lewis to raise money for Lewis’s foundation to fight HIV/AIDS. It has provided Gray with an opportunity to do a social good in a challenging setting.
“I heard [Lewis] speak at the Massey Hall lecture,” says Gray who has been supporting Lewis’s organization since high school. “He’s so motivating. When he speaks, you want to do something so badly. I figured if I could incorporate my music with the experience, all the better.”
It’s hard to envision Gray realizing the complex pop songs of his first EP, A Future’s Past, as a one-man acoustic band.
“Given that my arrangements are so dense, it’s hard to make an appealing sound out of myself solo. I’m going to be busking with the loop pedal and a battery-powered guitar amp,” notes Gray.
On the EP, Gray shows off a remarkable knack for dense, yet buoyant guitar and piano pop, holding elements of ’60s sunshine and modern indie in equal regard. While addictive melodies are present throughout, what is most striking is the complexity of his composition. The result is obviously born of a very particular songwriter.
“Not that I’m closed to suggestion, but whenever I write a song, I hear it in my head on a grander scale with arrangement and instrumentation,” says Gray. “I dig intense layering, stuff like Sufjan Stevens, these types of really elaborate arrangements. That’s something I love in [pop music], layering until you hit a huge crescendo.”
Realizing his specific vision was important to him, but Gray’s father, Juno-winning engineer Gary Gray helped him with production, making the task much easier.
“He’s more in the classical world now, but in the ’70s and the ’80s he did quite a few pop records and folk stuff. He did a lot of the early Bruce Cockburn stuff and Gordon Lightfoot.”
In Daniel’s estimate, the final product is the outcome of their collective sensibilities.
“He’s so much of a perfectionist and I prefer rough edges, so it’s kind of an interesting contrast. We come from different styles, but we try to combine them into something we can both agree on. He has good suggestions, like ‘this would sound really good doubled,’ in terms of production values.”
The songs, however, are distinctly Daniel’s, given that he sings and plays guitar, drum, organ, harmonica, samplers, and everything else on the record. While his proficiency comes from an entire life spent around music—his mother is a professional violinist—Daniel started writing songs a few years ago, and only recently began considering the possibility of taking music more seriously.
“When I was younger, music to me was the Red Hot Chili Peppers, U2, or these huge bands who make millions of dollars. I was being realistic about it. I never expected that I could do anything like that.”
However, having seen the unlikely success of more off-kilter pop musicians over the last few years has provided hope of a future career. Take Grizzly Bear, for example.
“They write psychedelic folk songs and somehow they became this huge band…I’ve noticed in the last year or so, ‘indie’ music has started to reach a new fan base, unlike in the ’90s or the ’80s. There’s a smaller gap between the indie labels and the majors now. [Many] people are making a living, and touring, and having a life with it. They’re not celebrities, and they’re not making millions of dollars, they’re making a modest living. But since I’ve been exposed to that kind of thing, I’ve made records of my own and become more ambitious in what I can do with that.”
For Gray, his expectations remain modest, even though his ambitions are high.
“If I can take it to a level where I can tour as much as I can and make a living off of it, then I think I probably would. It would be hard […] but people are discovering music they normally wouldn’t because it’s so easy to share.”
Daniel Gray’s EP, A Future’s Past, is available as a free digital download at danielgraymusic.bandcamp.com. He will be busking outside of stations along the Spadina subway line this week. He is also playing a show on Nov. 7 at the Concord Café.
