Following the February ’23 interpretation of Willie Nelson’s “Night Life”, Nomenclature (aka Denny Hanson) returns to herald an impending full-length of original material with an epic rally around Bob Dylan’s twilight anthem “Not Dark Yet”.
“I’ve been on this Dylan kick for a while now, really trying to hone in on my writing skills– obviously, he’s the best in the business,” says Macon native and current Nashville resident Hanson. “‘Not Dark Yet’, in particular, just spoke so deeply to me on both a personal level– just the trials and feelings associated with the loneliness of a searcher/artist– but also such a stark summation of our current social climate.”
Included on the superb Danial Lanois-produced Album of the Year (1998 GRAMMY) Time Out Of Mind, the tune is considered one of Dylan’s best– though Hanson’s version taps into the Jokerman’s original by strange proxy.
“Once I started really sinking my teeth into Time Out Of Mind, I saw it came out in ’97, which is the same year Brighten The Corners came out. So my approach on this was basically if Pavement did Dylan. Which, Stephen Malkmus does a great cover of ‘Ballad of a Thin Man’,” says Hanson. ” It also thematically just really aligns with what I’m doing on my newest record Death Of A Magician. We experience all kinds of deaths– physical, psychic, emotional. The fear and avoidance of those kinds of death can be its own kind of walking or running death.”
Hanson recorded “Not Dark Yet” at The Glow in Athens, Georgia with Jesse Mangum while on break from his regular duties performing with Rumours ATL: A Fleetwood Mac Tribute and during the same studio stretch as “Night Life”.
“I try to book four to five days every two months when I finally get time off from Rumours,” Hanson says. “‘Not Dark Yet’ could seem like a song of total despair to some people. I take it as a resounding shrugging of the shoulders, death as a thing that one not only should be resigned to but accept. I think it takes s certain level of courage, or dare I say rebelliousness in a culture like America’s– which is determined to squeeze the life out of you– to take the stance of like, ‘Okay, and?'”