A cat, sitting in the shade. A dog, resting its chin on the windowsill. Love, soft as a rabbit’s ear. The velvet comforts of domestic animals drift, in casual snapshots, through the jazz-folk daydream of Billie Marten’s fifth album, Dog Eared. The title speaks to the literary singer-songwriter’s sense of being a little worn, but loved, looking back at marked moments. It feeds into a sense of nostalgia that emanates from a record whose warm, fuzzy sound nods back to late-1970s Laurel Canyon. The splashes of electric piano like old Kodak snaps of swimming pools; the guitars sepia-toned; wonky notes a little out of focus and Marten’s rich melodies making direct eye contact with the present, as if from another time.
Having launched her career in her mid-teens as a writer of pretty and precocious folk songs, Yorkshire-born Marten, now 26, left the UK to record this album in New York. The plan was to make a “full band record” and relinquish a little control. Producer Philip Weinrobe (best known for work with indie artists Adrianne Lenker, Laura Veirs and Buck Meek) called for live takes, intuition and no headphones during the sweltering month the 10 musicians recorded “huddled in a circle” at his Sugar Mountain studio in Brooklyn. The cover art – by Brazilian-born painter Daniel Borgonovi, only after he’d heard the record – is a portrait of Marten without eyes. It reinforces the idea of her feeling her way, sharpening her ears and relaxing into the sonic cues.
The external urban environment sneaks its way into the mix. Breathy flutterings of distant saxophone – as though from a distant busker – make their way into “Goodnight Moon”, as Marten’s fingers slosh drowsily up and down the fretboard of her guitar. A rubber bridge on the acoustic guitar of Catalan musician Núria Graham adds a spritely Latin ping to single “Feeling”. The distorted fuzz of an off-kilter synth solo squiggles through “Clover”, as Marten swoons over feeling “so into you, so into you”, and a crunchy drum machine bites into the intro of “Crown”, before the swaying rattle of a real kit takes over. “Undo myself with every string,” croons Marten, “Don’t push it now, I’m choking.”
A sense of danger lurks around the corners of the soothing space that Dog Eared creates. “Don’t push me over/ I’m half your size,” Marten sings on “Clover”. Over the mulchy-bluesy sway of “No Sudden Changes”, she sings of being “the dust in the breeze/ a tugging at your sleeve”. “The Glass” finds her “restless and reaching” for the love like “a pocket full of gold” she almost finds on “Leap Year”. It’s a song in which Marten suggests she might “fall asleep here”, and the dozing flow of this album means it takes time for the 10 tracks to find their own spaces and the dazey melodies to take root.
At times, Dog Eared can feel like being let into a luxurious, vintage cabin at dusk. Sheepskin rugs on wooden floors, low lighting, open windows. At other times, it’s at risk of becoming classy, crepuscular wallpaper. But given time and attention, the confident craft of the songwriting and mellow musicianship will sink their grooves into the soul. Like the cats and dogs that pad softly in Marten’s lyrics, these are songs that will wait for trust to come. Then they’ll settle gently at your feet, slow your breathing and, as Marten sings on “Planets”, “keep the world there”.
