The Day Action Band are brothers Matt and Nate O’Keefe, keen keyboard collectors (and part time writers of novelty songs for baseball teams) from North Carolina. The band has been working together in various line-ups since 1991, and Wives and Babies is their second full album release.

As the title indicates, this could almost be described as a concept album (no wait! come back!), with a series of songs themed around the relationships, issues and problems of US menfolk rapidly approaching middle age. A variety of emotions are addressed in an intriguingly honest and realistic fashion, from “Time Moves Away From Me’s” nostalgia for the lost loves of their youth, and slight dissatisfaction with the present (“Eleven hours a day / Work I must obey / A little while at home / Before I turn to stone”); to the quiet unspoken satisfaction of a long-term commitment, in “Words Fail”.

Age certainly hasn’t necessarily led to contentment, however. The satisfyingly troublesome “Going to a Motel 6″, for example, depicts a married father about to take his first steps towards adultery – seemingly much to his own surprise and horror (“Can’t believe I’m doing this”). His worry about having left his child’s car seat in the back of the car is a nice, authentic-sounding detail. Forthcoming single “Every Breeze” seems to be describing someone stalking or at least spying on a woman in her home whilst ”Pray That I’m Able” also has a slightly stalkerish aspect to it lyrically (“I would build a bunker underneath your house if I could”).

One of the best tracks, lyrically, is “The Prettiest Girl That I Knew” which sings with candour and maturity about a relationship that is surviving despite the difficulties of young parenthood (“And I don’t know how it’s done / How they make you not to run”) and the temptation of the attractive girl at work.

Musically the approach is pretty straightforward, bordering – perhaps – on the disappointingly conservative. Best described as folk-tinged US rock-lite, the sound is occasionally enlivened by judicious use of organs or, on “Every Breeze”, banjo. There is a variability in the vocal which makes me wonder if the brothers alternative singing duties. If so, whichever one is singing on “Back of Your Car” has the more satisfying, warmer, richer voice.

In summary, then, the great strength here would seem to me to be in the wise, realistic and honest way in which “life issues” of your average thirtysomething male have been written about, giving an interesting and sometimes thought-provoking window on that world. Musically the album is not greatly innovative, certainly, but this too – in a sense – seems appropriate for the subject matter being addressed.
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Links
Day Action Band [official site] [myspace]