Barry Walker Jr. "Paleo Sol"
Barry Walker Jr. is a pedal steel guitarist whose playing is rooted in traditional forms and whose compositions push into entirely new frontiers. Rooted in country and folk traditions, his playing explores minimalism, ambient and spiritual music. The Portland-based instrumentalist’s playing is in high demand: in addition to his six solo records recorded under various monikers and collaborative projects Mouth Painter and North Americans, Walker has appeared on dozens of records and performed live with fellow Portlander Marisa Anderson and the late Michael Hurley. His playing with Rose City Band is lauded for its drive and how deftly it intertwines with lead guitarist Ripley Johnson, alchemizing what is often described as “the magic.” His latest work, Paleo Sol, is a collaboration with drummer Rob Smith (Animal, Surrender!, Gray/Smith, Rhyton, Pigeons) and bassist Jason Willmon (Mouth Painter, Fruited Planes). The album’s pedal steel melodies and finger-picked guitar figures create aural ranges and basins, its sonic landscapes carved by percussion and the warm drive of the bass. Drummer Rob Smith says of the record: “This country music is not adherent to ambient, cosmic, or minimalist aesthetics, but it does ignore property lines and takes its cues from the earth and the sky nevertheless. Instead of kicking the stalls and chomping at the bit, we gently pick the lock and slip out into the starry night.”
Paleo Sol was composed during a monumental shift in Walker’s own life as he and his wife, Valerie, welcomed their first child. The compositions are informed by those early nights, aiming for more serene, gentle passages and taking inspiration from lullabies, twilight, and new life blossoming, like the elves of Cuiviénen, despite what came after. Walker, a geologist, named the album in part after rocks called paleosols, which are ancient soils that are variably rusted and leached of their original components, plentiful in the John Day and Clarno Formations Walker has studied for years. The name takes on a dual meaning that reaches for an even deeper history, that of the ancient sun (the sun that broke apart the ancient water vapor, the sun that bore down on the Eohippus, the sun that brightens the tail of the comet, the sun that will be recycled billions of years hence). Walker’s approach to interrogating the earth and its shifts runs parallel to his approach to music: “The possibilities and uncertainty of pedal steel guitar often disorient me as a player and as a listener. The same is true for scientific exploration. Realizing the structural and harmonic components of a composition demands from me preparation, intense creativity, luck, and discipline, much like science.” On Paleo Sol, Barry Walker Jr. unearths new dimensions of his singular voice as a composer and as pedal steel player.
The Soft Pink Truth "Can Such Delightful Times Go On Forever?"
The Soft Pink Truth is Drew Daniel, also of Matmos with his husband M.C. Schmidt. Based in Baltimore where he is a professor in the Department of English at Johns Hopkins University, Daniel is acclaimed for his ability to merge highly conceptual material with music rich in feeling. The Soft Pink Truth albums share little stylistically except for an affinity for exquisite arrangements and lush compositions that transform searching questions into full body music. On Can Such Delightful Times Go On Forever?, The Soft Pink Truth grafts chamber music and electronic music into a beguiling new hybrid, drafting an international cast of collaborators from Turkey, Sweden, Italy, Spain and the United States. On the album, Daniel radically rethinks his approach to crafting music, and the results evoke mid-20th century film soundtracks, diverse traditions of minimalism, and the formal language of pop.
Can Such Delightful Times Go On Forever? is a singular album that speaks to the prowess of Drew Daniel as a composer and producer, deftly interlacing pop structure and classical timbre while interlacing subtle electronic sound design with gorgeous acoustics. Long ago in “Notes on Camp,” Susan Sontag said that “camp is a tender feeling.” Embracing a spirit of drama and romanticism that blurs the boundaries between unconscious desire and everyday reality, Daniel has created an untimely sound world of lavish fantasy that acts as a balm and counterpoint to the communal pains of modern life.
Geologist "Can I Get A Pack of Camel Lights?"
Geologist is the nom-de-théâtre of Brian Weitz, whose pursuits have been an active part of the music underground since since he was 15, playing and working in alignment with an organic ensemble of friends that would one day choose to call what they were doing Animal Collective. Can I Get a Pack of Camel Lights? migrates from that tradition, containing a number of surprise affects of its own. #1 is that it is the first-ever proper Geologist solo album! For real. Surprise #2 is its pursuit of a musical answer to the not-oft-enuf-ast question:
what if, back in the 80s, Ethan James had made a hurdy gurdy album for SST?
Geologist’s affirmative answer to the question begins with another question — Can I Get a Pack of Camel Lights?. It’s also the first step into a rippling songscape in which his hurdy gurdy gives and takes multiple forms, an epic electro-acoustic textile of many colors cut from the life and times of Brian Weitz. It’s an inspired ride through his phases and stages, with traditional sounds, ritual moods, avant, prog-jazz, kraut, post-punk and minimalist vibes merging in electronic infinity.
Tashi Dorji "low clouds hang, this land is on fire"
For his third new album release for Drag City, Tashi Dorji turns to the electric guitar. After the furious acoustic improvisations that drove the previous two—”Stateless” and “we will be wherever the fires are lit” — it’s easy to imagine an album of his electric guitar improvisations as an encompassingly incendiary essay. Especially when titled low clouds hang, this land is on fire. After all, this is a man capable of tearing up the place with the tactile musical violence of Bill Orcutt and Derek Bailey! And yet, this knowledge serves to set up a greater shock: the album’s disarmingly gentle musical drift.
When asked why he turned the knob down from 11 for this album, Tashi says simply, “To find the silence.” As ever with Tashi, this is a political statement. Even the search for silence takes intention and happens for a reason. In this time of such institutional inhumanity, what is there to feel but exhaustion? When seeing the faces of the deprived, what is there to feel other than hopelessness? In the face of such grief, what words are there to say?
So, Tashi got a couple amps, moved from the shed where he’d done his first two DC titles, set up in a room in the family home with high ceilings and dialed in the reverb. Once the sound was in the space, reflecting in a manner that he felt congenial with his mood, he taped it. It’s a striking signal, meditative and melancholy, with a delicacy comparable to the lineage of Loren Connors or Bill Frisell, the songs at times developed with the deliberate exposition of themes in raga’s alap form. It’s a sound that lives within silence.