When reviewing Troy Cassar-Daley’s last album, The World Today (2021), I compared him to Orpheus, going to the Underworld in search of his wife, Eurydice, who had been taken there by Hades. But after going into the darkness to find what he was looking for then turning back at the point of rescue only to see Eurydice disappear – as the myth has it – Cassar-Daley as Orpheus turned his face forwards and stepped into the light, as complicated as the path ahead was.

‘Troy Cassar-Daley has long been a beacon in our culture,’ I wrote then, ‘for his songs and the way he delivers them. With this album he takes on not mythic status, because he’s still with us, but he becomes, perhaps, a warrior for the people. Out of his darkness we can find light, and the only thing left to say to him is “thank you”.’

That album remains as one of its creator’s very best, and a classic by many measures. It seemed unlikely that he could better it, for how would he find a deeper well to draw on, how much further could he go into the darkness and, to balance, how much light would he discover on his return? The answer has arrived in the form of his new album, Between the Fires, which is an epic work of love, loss, water, fire and smoke, of country and connection, written almost entirely by Cassar-Daley alone in the wake of the death of his mother, then recorded in her home.

The depth of Cassar-Daley’s sorrow is soaked into this album, as is his resolution to find light once again. He growls, he rails, he ponders the past and looks to construct a future that may not have included his wife, Laurel, as they went through a separation around the same time, which is also part of the fabric of this album. Most of all, though, he pays tribute to his mother, and we are shown – more than we are told – how much of a man she helped to make him. For the work done there is his too, and the unforgettable resolution of the album, ‘Moving On’, is his alone.

There is a verse in the Vijnana Bhairava Tantra, a revealed text of Kashmir Shaivism, that goes:

Live continuously for a few days in the meditation,

‘I am immersed in the flame,

The flame of life, the flame of love, the flame of time.

The universal fire flows through me.’

Step into that fire fully, wholeheartedly,

Starting with the toe of the left foot –

And then surrendering everywhere.

Only the not-self, which doesn’t exist anyway,

Is burned.

(Verse 29, translation by Lorin Roche)

Between the Fires documents Troy Cassar-Daley’s burning of the not-self and consequent revelation of the self. Through the fire of grief and change we are able to see the man as he is now and was always meant to be. There is so much bravery required to step into this flame and to go on afterwards, let alone present what remains to the world.

For more about Troy Cassar-Daley: https://troycassardaley.com.au/

Listen to Between the Fires on Apple Music

Listen to Between the Fires on Spotify

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