It’s a déjí  vu moment as Daniel Wesley slips into a booth at Moxie’s Classic Grill in Kits for a chat with the Straight (and the downing of a couple of Guinness). The same scenario played out in February 2008, only back then Daniel Wesley was also the name of a trio that included bassist Mark Luongo and drummer Alex Glassford. I recall the interview well, because all three members were excited by the fact that their album, Sing + Dance, was having its Canada-wide release that day. After our barley-fuelled chat everyone jaywalked across busy Broadway to Future Shop, to view the bright pink disc on display in the CD racks. The threesome was totally psyched at that time to hop in Wesley’s 2005 Jimmy and take those tunes all the way across snowy Canada.

But things change, and so do people. That honeymoon is over, and now Daniel Wesley is back to the solo-artist status he started with. He seems a tad more reserved than he did 21 months ago, but still confident about things. It helps that, just minutes before, he had an ego-boosting encounter on a city bus.

“This girl beside me had an iPod with the headphones blaring,” says Wesley, “and ”˜Ooo Ohh’ was on, and then I could hear ”˜Diggy’ and ”˜Pilgrimage’ and a bunch of songs. It was kinda funny, so I had to bump her on the shoulder and say, ”˜Hey, you’re listening to me.’ She just kinda laughed and was like, ”˜Well, this is awkward,’ and I was like, ”˜No, it’s fine—it’s a first for me!’ ”

There have been a few firsts for the 27-year-old singer-songwriter of late. His recently released self-titled CD is his first on 604 Records, the local label that Nickelback built. It’s also the first album he’s made with a producer—that being former Matthew Good Band and current 54-40 guitarist Dave Genn.

“As a songwriter, he can do amazing things,” raves Wesley, “and as a player, he handled keys and a couple of guitar things. Then as a producer, he’s just got a good mind for how arrangements and harmonies should go.”

Genn has also developed lots of contacts within the local musical scene, which he called upon to recruit pedal-steel player Steve Dawson and vocalists Sherry St. Germain and Kelly Brock. And when banjo seemed like a cool idea for one tune, Wesley used his own connections to bring in CFOX programming director Chris “Dunner” Duncombe.

“I had this song called ”˜Family’ which was real important to me,” he explains, “but I wanted to make sure it was stripped-down and easy to connect to. We thought a banjo would just kick it into gear, so Dunner came in and put a tasty little thing behind it.”

Other guests on Daniel Wesley include guitarist Russ Klyne, saxophonist Alexander Maher, and vocalist Citizen A, but more crucial to the overall vibe of the disc is the rhythm section of bassist Darren Parris and drummer Tim Proznick, who cowrote “Untitled #4”, the breezy instrumental that opens the CD.

“It was always hard to find a drummer in Vancouver that can play the reggae beats but doesn’t play like a rock drummer,” Wesley points out, “but Timmy comes from a really jazzy background, so there’s a lot more swing to it. And then Darren can play everything—he’s happy playing the simplest thing to the most complex.”

On the whole, Daniel Wesley revisits similar terrain to the feel-good reggae-pop exemplified by “Ooo Ohh”, the ganja-inspired number that became CFOX’s most requested song of 2007. Apart from another round of tributes to beer and reefer (“Drunk + Stoned”) and lyrics that comment on Lower Mainland gang wars (“Cocaine + Cops”, the first single “Pilgrimage”), the album is pretty much an all-ages affair. The sing-along ditty “Diggy” sounds like it could be a big hit with the shovel ’n’ pail set at Kits beach.

“It’s not targeted to a certain audience,” Wesley notes. “It’s male or female, from little kids to grandparents. I try not to close any doors when I do my music.”

Though some of Wesley’s music comes off as ’round-the-campfire-type material—and indeed that’s part of his playful appeal—much of it is derived from real-life experience, not all of which is lighthearted. The sombre closing track, “Time For Leaving”, tries to put the breakup of the previous Daniel Wesley lineup in perspective.

“I’d always thought we’d play together forever,” says Wesley of his former bandmates, “but then things just kinda go their own course. So that song was my own emotional place that I went to, where I just laid it on the table. For me it was tryin’ to make a positive out of a negative, to create that kinda mood where not everything’s okay—but it will be.”

Daniel Wesley plays the Commodore Ballroom on Friday and Saturday (November 27 and 28).