Elliott probably suffererd from dysthmia…I feel though that his music was always very observant and counter-intuitive to that state of mind…Its like his underlayer paints were always shaded in the same tints, but his fatter colors were always representative of concrete, empirical finds…thats what I’ve come to love about his music.
To explain the Elliott Smith analogy while take a little while, so here it goes. In painting, there is a basic and fundamental layering of paints which serve to create the final picture. Underlayer painting is essentially a very thin set of layers which “draw” in the contour lines and figures in the picture. Leonardo Da Vinci did up to 30 layers before applying what are considered ‘fatter layers’.
In Elliotts case, his underlayer paints are represented by his turbulent past-which I am guessing haunted him untill he died. I believe that his upbringing was so strong and turbulent that his underlayer foundation became very solid and conscionable, which is why his songs all tend to have that same feel to them.
His inspirations for lyrics and themewhere boldly chosen, impressionistic colors-so Smith was basically setting an experimental fat layer over a very solid underlayer, which is why his catalogue never seemed to fade.
With many musicians, it is the opposite…the underlayer is always erratic, and taken from present themes…and their fatter layer is subconsciously taken from the past…thats why thier songs fade and feel dated. Its just a cross examination-but it makes sense of why his music is so different.