David Saw was born in 1974 to a family who lived in Aylesbury outside of London. He had brothers named Peter and Paul. The three boys would don caps and backpacks filled with healthy lunchmeats and schoolbooks, none of which David Saw would read. As they roughed their two miles to school, David would see the schoolhouse and nod goodbye to his brothers and take a swift left down the hill to the town. His first stop was the chocolate shop, but within minutes he was outside the guitar store, where he waited for what seemed like hours for the doors to open. He spent days hanging out there with a seasoned guitarist who owned the shop, admiring the vintage guitars, mandolins and five stringed basses that must have been played by troubadours under balconies centuries ago to serenade maidens whose hair fell in curls over balconies. He passed the days there teaching himself guitar.

David spent much of his time early on listening to his uncle’s record collection, which was filled with artists who he was in awe of: Hendrix, Page, Robert Johnson. He absorbed as only a twelve-year-old could absorb. He was enthralled. The schoolmasters and marms would never have understood Hendrix nor the joy David experienced while listening to him.

At the age of 18, David joined a cover band and toured England playing mostly Motown, cutting his teeth on Steve Cropper’s guitar style. This band, called Some Like it Hot was followed by other bands: grunge, hard rock, R&B and blue grass. Without even looking or counting, it was 2001. David had seen it all in the bars, taverns, music halls, poolrooms, theaters and tour busses of the late eighties and nineties. He’s had his beer, switched hats and vests, and escorted the ladies who, in a different time, were on the balconies in Italian squares.

In that year of 2001, David had a propitious meeting with Mark Nevin who was a well-known singer with the band Fairground Attraction. The two hit it off and pulled the proverbial “all nighter” where they stayed up getting drunk and passing the guitar back and forth. The evening resulted in Mark’s convincing David to go it alone, write his own songs and sing them live on his own tour. Ready to take on this task was like putting on his slippers and bathrobe: he was so ready for it. This led to David’s first album, A Different Story, released in the U.K. in 2003. It was so successful that it led to his touring with Ray Davies, Eric Bibb and Pattie Griffin.

It was during this time period that he met Ben Taylor at a venue in Shepherd’s Bush. Ben and David must have been brothers in a past life, so instant was their bond. The songs poured forth. They sounded like heaven and mischief, like water and sand. It worked. David soon came to America and met Carly Simon who by a quirk of fate happened to be Ben’s mum. She recorded the first song David had ever written way back when called, “Quiet Evening” as well as a co-written song with Ben called, “I’ll Just Remember You.” These songs are both on Simon’s Into White.

David was so much part of the Simon-Taylor family that he moved into a room in Ben’s family home while Ben lives in a house twelve paces away. There is constant music and the cooking of dinner over fire pits. Let’s not forget the occasional feeding of and tending to the fainting goats and donkeys. Freaky people come by and contribute to a generous musical atmosphere. It is here where David wrote and produced with Ben and Larry Ciancia, a brand new record called Broken Down Figure.

This very warm, wonderful and already popular album was released on Iris Records in March 2008.

Broken Down Figure has songs ranging from the fairly sad to the very sad. It’s easier for David to write in that kind of mood. He said, “While things are easy and fun, you almost forget where you have left your guitar, even though as it turns out it’s really still in your hands.” The lead off song, “Don’t Call,” is a song about leaving a relationship and trying to make it easier on yourself when all you really want to do is the opposite, i.e. have your loved one call.

“By My Record,” which comes complete with video, is an uncompromising dictate to delay not even a second. It’s ironic in its lack of modesty and pokes fun at itself. David is at his rollicking self when he performs this song and you can see a hip shake if you look carefully enough. The video promises to advertise the Porsche speedster.

“Savannah’s World” is so picturesque and is about a young girl David met on MySpace who, out of the blue and for very good and very bad and very odd-shaped reasons, asked him to marry her. This song has already become a hit in local coffee houses and on campuses around the area where David lives. DJs have hit each other in arguments over who gets the CD, not even acknowledging that they can burn one off of each other. Savannah’s world is enduring and it has proven itself already.

“All at Sea” is a song of loss, where the hell is the shoreline - that kind of thing that we all experience. But the wistfulness of the way David performs this makes the listener tear up and forget the idea of doing anything but wanting to take him out for a beer and buy him a new scarf.

-Carly Simon, 2007