The Silver Jews songwriter refracted Americana to illuminate knotty problems of self and state with simple, brilliant poetryDavid Berman, acclaimed US indie songwriter, dies aged 52The
United States is so geographically vast, so culturally unaligned, that it’s rare that one sound, one voice, has ever articulated the sum of the nation’s consciousness.
David Berman was not one such voice. He wasn’t Elvis,
Jay-Z or Dylan. The late singer of New York’s Silver Jews and Purple Mountains – the band with which he emerged from self-appointed exile, and who released their eponymous debut only last month – wrote songs that were awkward and askew, that either by design but more likely execution were not made for mass appeal. Berman made outsider music: songs to be enjoyed and championed beneath the glass ceiling for voices like his.