Douglas Dare is a London based singer-songwriter who originally harks from the West Country. With a piano teacher for a father, he was always exposed to music and this helped him develop into one of the UKs most talented multi instrumentalists.

This release comes from his 3rd album, and I think it’s fair to say now that Douglas Dare is no longer the baby of the pop world and is now an artist that is going to become much more of a common player on our mainstream radio shows. 

There’s a game I sometimes play when reviewing songs, it’s pretty simple and I’m normally wrong, but before I hear a song for the first time, I like to try and work out what the song will be about based just on the title. For example, happy or sad, upbeat or ballad etc... Obviously the artists style will often be a give away, but the song topic is always more open. ‘The Joy in Sarah’s eyes’ proved an interesting challenge, my initial thought was it might be a love story, and to an extent it is, but it’s a lot more than that. The first thing you want to know is who Sarah is, and why she is the subject of the song. It is this point, which for me, takes Douglas Dare to another level of creativity. Sarah is him! It’s his own view and memory of growing up, and when you know that, you understand its brilliance and how this new album fits together. The album is called ‘Milk Teeth’ and the songs explore childhood and childhood innocence. The fact that Douglas Dare is often sometimes known as Visa Reasons might give a hint as to why a female character was used to document his childhood. 

As a song, ‘The joy in Sarah’s eyes’ is beautiful, it’s calming and oozes the innocence of the lyrics. With high falsetto voices opening the melody, leading into the story, you feel you know how this song will make you feel from the very opening. The instrumentation is simple, with a nice familiar chord progression that lets the vocal line stand out and pull you into the story that Douglas Dare wants you to hear. The vocal recordings remind me of some of the 60s ballads, as do the melody lines, but this song is not dated in anyway. It is fresh, with clever synths and clean instrumentation that works wonderfully well. ‘The Joy in Sarah’s eyes’ brought joy to my ears and showed what a very clever writer and musician Douglas Dare is.

 Singer-songwriter 

Author: Phil Arnold

Phil Arnold is a musician, producer and music reviewer from Devon, in the South West of England. Whilst not writing music reviews, Phil also writes and records under the name of Ugbrooke.