Danielson Famile

In a way, it's appropriate that the best function of this new two-disc collection of eclectic Pentecostalist musician Daniel Smith is evangelical. In other words, devoted fans may buy this record (for the live tracks, at very least, or the marvelous but brief Rick Moody essay in the liner notes), but they're even more likely to buy it for someone else, in hopes of adding another member to the tribe. It may convert a few or provoke those who picked up Ships on the prompting of critics into delving deeper. However, in this case, the problem with a "best of" is that Smith's strength, from his earliest effort, A Prayer for Every Hour, to his solo record as Brother Danielson, Brother Is to Son, has lain in the cohesiveness of his albums.

Tunes, lyrics, and album art may not have followed any traditional patterns, and Smith's songs often end up in a very different place than the one in which they started, but any attempt to find a real design here other than in the cover (a representation of the way red, blue, and green light unite to form white, which can be read in Christian and band history terms) is necessarily futile. Trying Hartz contains much that is wonderful. There's the yelpy foot-tapper "Rubbernecker," the mix of goofiness and uncanny in "Smooth Death," the sweet simplicity of "Hammers Sitting Still" and the rousing sing-along of "Don't You Be the Judge." But, it's missing the arrow-straight intentionality of the proper albums.

—Hillary Brown
11.11.08

For the uninitiated, it hardly matters whether their introduction to the Danielson Famile comes in the form of a retrospective, a studio recording, a film, or in concert. All it really takes is a few minutes in the shrieking presence of Ringmaster Daniel Smith's alternately tender, ferocious and undeniably forward-thinking Christian post-punk/alternative folk collective for one to figure out whether or not they have the patience to commit to the full circus or not. To call the songs that inhabit the two-disc Trying Hartz anthology "outsider music" is doing the term a disservice. Through 28 tracks culled from works released between 1996 and 2004, Trying Hartz follows Smith, along with his siblings and friends on a ten year vision quest, capably described by author Rick Moody in the liner notes as "proto-minimalist eccentric gospel band to prog-metal-dread outfit to music hall choir to indie rock one-man band to outsider art celebrity to family man and family member." From the early, lo-fi folk of Prayer for Every Hour and Tell Another Joke at the Ol' Choppin' Block to the tight, focused, immaculately mad snap of the Steve Albini-produced Fetch the Compass Kids, Trying Hartz (which in true Danielson fashion is available with an optional limited-edition "Danielson" shoe created by the John Fluevog boutique) is a far more inclusive, pure and honest testament to faith than the soulless, over-produced fast food that passes for contemporary gospel in the 21st century. ~ James Christopher Monger, All Music Guide