Love Letter To A Record: Nathan Cavaleri On The Teskey Brothers ‘Half Mile Harvest’

September 22, 2018

Many of us can link a certain album to pivotal moments in our lives. Whether it’s the first record you bought with your own money, the chord you first learnt to play on guitar, the song that soundtracked your first kiss, the album that got you those awkward and painful pubescent years or the one that set off light bulbs in your brain and inspired you to take a big leap of faith into the unknown – music is often the catalyst for change in our lives and can even help shape who we become.

In this series, Music Feeds asks artists to reflect on their relationship with music and share with us stories about the effect music has had on their lives.

Nathan Cavaleri — The Teskey Brothers’ Half Mile Harvest

Dear Half Mile Harvest,

Josh, do you ever look at yourself in the mirror and wonder who in hell is really singing from inside of you? It’s clear the emotion is real, as is the voice, but not all of us are blessed with such amazing tone and character to build off, transcendent of cultural origins.

As a guitarist “by trade” and a frustrated drummer, I notice the strings, the beat and the melodies before I hear the one person on the mic using the most primitive of instruments – the voice. However, yours managed to make me forget that I am a guitarist. Your tone and melodies swept me up, landing me smack in the middle of the worlds that you sing of.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybbsjP3GptQ

From the despair of ‘Crying Shame’ and ‘Pain And Misery’, to the reassurances of ‘Shiny Moon’ that sings lyrics that leave me feeling both gratified and disappointed. Gratified because someone has creatively captured a very special belief that I’ve held on to. Particularly when I was sick as a kid, I used to look up to the moon and stars as guiding spirits. So to hear a song that triggers those memories in a style that I have such a deep connection with, is a magic thing. Disappointed because you guys wrote the song before I could!

The tasty arrangements, sweet guitar licks, earthy dead drum tones, and plenty of dimension between each song all hugged by warm and crusty retro production makes this an album that I can listen to from start to finish over and over again. It’s clear that The Teskey Brothers were courageous enough to stay true to the styles that they vibe on. It reminded me that I should continue to do the same.

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Nathan Cavaleri is a Sydney-based indie-rock and blues artist and his incredible new single ‘Demons’ is out now. Listen — and catch his full list of celebratory national tour dates — below!