Douglas Dare – Aforger

We discovered Douglas Dare a few years back via Erased Tapes, who have released all of his work to date, and every time we’ve been moved sufficiently to warrant a post on Irregular Crates, as Dare’s work comfortably finds its way towards the top of our End Of Year features. His latest record Aforger is a deeply honest account where personal struggles had leaked into the record, however Dare’s sound here is easily his most complete and accomplished to date. Of course, Douglas Dare has been writing and composing songs over his previous albums, yet in Aforger they adopt a more song-like stance than ever before. This could be attributed to the more prominent placement of drums in the production, or perhaps that more electronica seeps into his production than ever before. The electronica is apt, as Douglas Dare began to really question what is real and true and purposely allowed the production to be warped and manipulated, whilst his voice and piano remain to keep things grounded.