Returning to the shed from a first sea kayaking experience on Alaska’s Inner Passage, I was greeted by the voice of Greg Brown, soon interpreted by the enthusiastic commentary of my kayaking guide. I resolved that I would come to know this singer as a living souvenir of the kayaking thing. `Soon as I could, I ordered The Poet Game rather at random from Brown’s prodigious menu of recordings.
Shades of the Man in Black come through in Brown’s the astonishing low range of Brown’s understated vocals. Better still, his song-writing is top-drawer stuff. It oozes authenticity, manouvers on the kind of observations a man can stand by, rings true.
A certain pokey humor—the kind that takes the mickey out of city folks and their pretensions without actually disliking them—flavors Greg Brown’s art. He’s not out to change the world or shatter champagne glasses with high C’s. He just wants to tell a story. Maybe two, always as he sees it.
They, again, ring true. One after another.
Canter Bridge 
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