Part IV: Back to the river, and out into the universe: a voice in the wilderness
In 1990 he would meet the woman who was to become his second wife a year later, Anastasia Savage, and about whom he would pen a lovesong on his eleventh album. Part of a double set, “The wild places” was in fact released three years before the followup, second part, but he had intended the two albums to bookend each other, telling a story of the abuse of nature and the environment by man, and warning, as he had briefly on previous albums, that something had to be done or we would all regret it in the future.
However, this album also retraced the time he spent at sea on his boat, evoking and remembering the stillness and solitude when he lived in the Rockies (he now lived on a ranch in Colorado); it's full of reflections and musings, remembrances and memories. The pain of his first divorce seems in the distant past now, and his new love has reinvigorated his songwriting. Like “Phoenix”, it's kicked off by a short instrumental which then powers into the title track, an exploration and prayer to the joy of nature. His dedication to the woman who would become his second wife, “Anastasia's eyes”, is one of the loveliest ballads he had written in years, and he returned to the subject of his family, and their family, in the song “Forefathers”, where he chronicled the meeting of his mother and father and their move to the USA, his own birth and that of his two brothers, and the different paths they each took in life.
But the political themes are there for all to see, and the anger evident in songs like “Blind to the truth” and his cover of Bruce Cockburn's “Lovers in a dangerous time" is shot through with frustration that everyone can't see the world as he does, see what we're doing to our planet and decide to stop before it's too late. This is balanced by lighter fare such as “The song of the sea” and his rendition of the Cascades' classic “Rhythm of the rain”, and he also references Native American and other cultures concerned with more spiritual things as an alternative to what he sees as big business choking the world, desperate for a buck.
Dan had always been a strong advocate of human rights and of preserving nature, and he was truly shocked by how the world was going, determined to do anything he could, through his medium, to raise awareness of the wrong path humanity was on, and try to help us see that there was another way. His next album, released in 1993, which formed the second part of the song cycle begun on “The wild places”, addresses this very forcefully, with tracks like “All there is” and “Faces of America”, the latter betraying a familiarity with Springsteen. But there are lighter moments too, like the salsa-influenced and joyful “Magic every moment”, which opens the album, the infectious “Serengeti moon”, which more than any other song really shows Dan's love of and respect for nature and all living things, and the Beatles-inspired ballad “A love like this”.
It's hard however to ignore the small but strong voice that runs throughout this album, at times whispering and at times shouting for change, for understanding, for just basic human sanity in a world that seems to have gone crazy. The title track, with its laidback, sultry, almost bossa-nova rhythm and the anthemic powerful closer, “A voice for peace”, underline this best. I do wonder, however, about the brass-run, jazz-inflected “Holy road”, which seems to bear an uncanny resemblance to both the melody and rhythm of Nanci Griffith's “One blade shy of a sharp edge”, which appeared on her “Late night grande hotel” album, released two years previously. Coincidence? You'd have to hope so.
His second song cycle, as it were, complete, Dan relaxed a little and decided to get in touch again with his old partner Tim Weisberg, but for their second collaboration they shared a joke which would only be apparent to fans and those who had seen the sleeve of the “Twin sons of different mothers” album. On that one, as mentioned, Dan and Tim look quite alike --- whether this was happenstance or contrived I don't know --- but at this point almost twenty years had passed and any resemblance between the two men had disappeared. Consequently, they called the album “No resemblance whatsoever”, but recreated the cover of the first album, making it quite plain that they were no twins of any sort. Nice one, guys.
Once again, Tim was more than happy to leave the writing to Dan, and every song on this album is one of his, other than two covers of Youngbloods songs. The cleverly-titled “Forever Jung” features a truly beautiful flute solo by Weisberg against a bopping, easy beat, with some slick jazzy brass, while the opener, “County Clare”, showcases Dan at his laidback best on the piano joined by Tim on a song that's rather expectedly given a celtic, Irish feel thanks to the lovely, haunting flute. Much of the album, like its predecessor seventeen years prior, is instrumental, and you can tell it's obviously an album made for the sheer joy of making music, that the two men enjoyed working together and were eager to do so again.
Dan is not averse to showing his virtuosity on the guitar either, as evidenced in the Spanish-leaning “Todos santos” and you have to believe that the second-last track, entitled “Stasia”, is intended to be dedicated to his second wife, for whom he also wrote a song on the album “The wild places” in 1990. This would be the last time Weisberg and Fogelberg would work together, but they produced two fine, and very different, albums through their collaborations.
A year after the completion of this album, Dan and Anastasia would break up. I'm not privy to the details --- they're not even available from his own personal website --- and probably correct, too: some things are private and should remain so. Apart from a Christmas album released as the millennium turned, Dan's next, and indeed last album was released in 2003, one year after he met his third, and final, wife, Jean Marie Mayer. With no pressure any more for hit singles or crowd-pleasers, and comfortable in his own musical skin, Dan returned to the folk/country days of his early years, creating an album that would bring, as the title suggested, his music and his life full circle.