Lake Saint Daniel – Small Thoughts | Album Review
/
Take This To Heart Records
Daniel Radin wears many hats: Bummer Pop musician, producer, pinball operator, and b-horror VHS enthusiast. With Lake Saint Daniel, I’m gonna make a case for alt-country philosopher as well. Don’t believe me? Well, I have receipts: check out the band’s playlist, Songs that Give me Existential Dread but in a Good Way. Beginning with modern cuts from Wild Pink and The Tallest Man on Earth and stretching all the way back to classic singer-songwriter fare like James Taylor and Judee Sill, it’s immediately clear that self-proclaimed adult contemporary artist Lake Saint Daniel is operating in a very different realm than the emo-adjacent indie rock Radin is known for.
The title of Lake Saint Daniel’s new record, Small Thoughts, might lead you to believe that you’re about to hear an unassuming collection of everyday observations, and while that’s true on a certain level, I think there’s a level of ironic self-deprecation at play there. Although Radin spends the album’s first track resolving to “keep [his] thinking small,” things get existential real quick. In the House of Small Thoughts, the mundane is all part of the cosmic gumbo.
Throughout Radin’s second outing as his folksy side-project, the music remains cozy and reassuring even when it gets heavy, a quaintly furnished safe place where you can let your thoughts wander. Soon enough, you can’t remember what triggered it, but you were washing the dishes, and now you’re having a flashback to 3rd grade, soundtracked by the distant lilt of pedal steel.
There’s a compelling ease to the way Radin and friends have pushed the sound from their debut into widescreen here. There are even conceptual throughlines from Good Things, such as the fact that both albums begin with one-minute songs that introduce the themes of the record, though it seems to start with slightly more optimism this time around. It’s almost like an indie folk “producer tag” welcoming you back to Radin’s world, which is something I can confidently say I haven’t heard in this style of music before. The project’s throughlines of childhood nostalgia, friendship, and relentless self-reflection all reprise their roles, but every new insight feels novel, and the vision has only grown sharper.
On Small Thoughts, we find little leafy green synth tendrils coming up through the cracks amid the gently grounding presence of piano. The atmosphere is breezy and familiar, buoyed by production that really makes it all sparkle. Though the album largely operates in the bucolic universe we’ve come to expect from Lake Saint Daniel, the project quickly ventures into some uncharted territory. Mid-album cut “Strange Timing” starts as the project’s quietest song to date but gradually mounts to hit the listener with some legitimately disrespectful fuzz as the band rips into a full downtempo indie rock tilt. The energy of this song’s arrangement is also somewhat reminiscent of “Sister” by Sufjan Stevens, one of the songs featured on the aforementioned existential dread playlist. Overall, though, the aesthetic hallmarks are comfort and warmth. Every melody is effortless, even when floating over clever chord choices that bear witness to Radin’s power pop chops.
The sweetness of it all might be a bit much if it weren’t cut so deftly by Radin’s dark humor, stark self-reflection, and a guileless sprinkling of expletives. It’s thorny, but there’s something so pure at the core. It’s like a dead flower bouquet. This is the only project that could cover Kermit the Frog’s “Rainbow Connection” and pull off a video where the singer is benevolently haunted by the muppet's likeness.
The album’s second single, “Faithless,” offers a perfect example of Lake Saint Daniel’s signature blend of humor, horror, and epistemology:
Guess I’ve been reading
Too much Stephen King
Now I don’t believe anything
In the suitably grisly lead single “Blood, Guts, and Gross Stuff,” Radin delivers a line that reads like an apt thesis statement for the album when he sings, “Trying my best to make meaning less meaningless.” In addition to showcasing the songwriter’s knack for turning a phrase, it feels like the embodiment of a more metamodern approach to meaning-making. It takes a certain kind of humility and self-awareness to admit that it’s helpful to construct significance, even when you doubt there’s any real substance to it. Am I holding onto hope because I think things are actually going to get better, or is it all just an act of self-preservation? Personally, I think it’s good to have things that help us get out of bed in the morning (or rather, keep us dreaming). I’m a meaning-making machine by nature, and I’d rather lean in than disintegrate.
The tension of cynicism and reluctant hope that animates Small Thoughts is something I’ve been reflecting on at my tech support day job. It feels like I’m always just one phone call away from a bracingly life-affirming interaction or losing my faith in humanity. On one level, I’ve developed some thicker skin, which can be helpful, but the shadow side is a sort of baseline mistrust towards other people. On songs like “Real Darkness,” Lake Saint Daniel finds a way to hold out for something better without trivializing the bleak state of our reality. There’s a real empathy at the core, but despair still has a seat at the table.
“But most people try their best just in case you had forgot.” I think that’s true. I need reminders.
There’s so much I want to touch on here that I don’t have words for, and so many quotable lines. The first Lake Saint Daniel record reminds me of driving to my dear friend’s wedding in New Mexico, a little lost on dirt roads and giddy with anticipation. The Future Teens album from 2022 found me right when I needed it, stumbling through an abandoned playground at midnight, lost in a different way. These songs have made a real difference in my life, and I’d encourage you to spend some time with them. And maybe (just maybe) consider sharing some of your own thoughts, however small they might seem.
Nick Webber lives in Denver, CO, where he makes music with his friends in A Place For Owls and under his own name.
