REVIEW : The Graduation Ceremony - Huffington Post

by Shawn Amos , 05/25/11


Joseph Arthur has been releasing his deeply textured tunes since 1997, when Peter Gabriel discovered him. Full disclosure: I covered Arthur's song "Dear Lord" on my own 2005 album after it kept me together in the days and weeks after my mother's suicide two years earlier.

His songs turn dislocation heavenward and transform isolation into a rendezvous with angels. Joseph Arthur does what only few artists can accomplish: he gives shape and sound to innermost thoughts and conversations that are otherwise unknowable. "The Graduation Ceremony" is another one of those conversations.

Only now, Arthur opens his arms a little wider than usual. Maybe his time with Fistful of Mercy (the one-off group project with Ben Harper and Dhani Harrison) got him digging the idea of surrounding himself with bigger sounds and sharing musical space. Arthur gets the balance of esoterica and catchiness just right.

These are songs worthy of being called your new best friends.