Marisa Anderson — The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music Vol. 1 (Thrill Jockey)
Photo by Shaun Astor
“Un-American” is an ambiguous adjective. The notorious House Un-American Activities Committee that sought to combat alleged communist influences in the United States in the 1950s immediately comes to mind, but, in this case, “un” simply means “not,” as in folk music originating elsewhere than the Americas. The full title also alludes to the influential Anthology of American Folk Music collected by Harry Smith on Folkways Records, for here Marisa Anderson focuses on a batch of traditional music from the Middle East and Asia collected by Smith that is now housed, along with the rest of his archives, at the Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa. Anderson was granted access to the collection, from which she chose the selections presented in this recording.
Naturally, the focus is on guitar, both electric and acoustic, but Anderson also plays some other stringed instruments (e.g., the tres cubano) as well as keyboards and accordion and is joined on several tracks by Gisela Rodríguez-Fernández on violin and viola. The sound is clear and spacious, with from one to three instruments on each track. The well-written liner notes provide detailed documentation of both the sources and Anderson’s approach to adapting them for Western instruments.
The album opens with a drone played on accordion followed by a flurry of acoustic hammer-ons and pull-offs; this tune, named “Quodlibet” in the original source after a Central Asian genre (with a Latin name), combines three distinct melodies from distinct traditions, all in less than three minutes. As Anderson observes in the liner notes, on this and other tracks, it was necessary to adapt the microtones of the original compositions for instruments (guitars and keyboards) that are restricted to semitones; a comparison with the original demonstrates the effectiveness of Anderson’s approach as well as the beauty and allure of the tradition.
Similarly, “Taqsim for Guitar” involves the adaptation of a Western instrument — the violin — widely used in modern Arab music because of its ability to produce microtones (there being, of course, no frets). Anderson’s performance of this lovely Syrian composition captures its stateliness, with cascades of notes and bent strings punctuated by slight pauses. “Rabāba,” by contrast, is built from three tracks (electric guitar and traditional Cuban and Mexican stringed instruments) that combine to recreate the driving repetition that characterizes the original solo piece on the instrument for which it is named.
Other pieces make use of electric piano to create drones over which the melodies dance. “Pair of Duduk” is characterized by a gentle rise in pitch, while “Rop Koh” immediately reveals its Southeast Asian origins (Cambodia) without descending into exoticism, especially with the pedal steel recreating the feel of a bowed instrument. A very simple, trance-inducing Vietnamese melody played entirely on electric piano (“Whistle Song”) closes out the set.
Rodríguez-Fernández’s contributions on violin and viola enliven “Sarvi Simin” and “Zar.” As a result of the aforementioned adaptability of the bowed instruments, these tracks are the most non-Western-sounding in the set. Their inclusion also contributes variety to the overall sound of the album.
Among the most ambitious projects in Anderson’s ambitious catalog, The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music Vol. 1 is a major achievement in terms of scholarship and bringing these fascinating and compelling pieces of music to a broad audience, in like manner as Harry Smith’s anthology helped popularize U.S. folk music. It is also a pleasure to listen to and a demonstration of Anderson’s understated mastery of the guitar. Hopefully, other volumes will follow.
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The days are long, the grass smells sweet and insect buzz is an ever present ambient soundtrack. Mid-summer, yes, and time for another Dusted Midyear switch, the annual feature in which we all review other people’s favorite records, whether we like them or not.
We don’t agree on everything, obviously, but there did seem to be an unusual consensus this year around Julianna Barwick and Mary Lattimore’s Tragic Magic. Ditto for Marisa Anderson’s The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music Vol. 1 (though it wasn’t anyone’s #1 or #2) and Setting’s self-titled album.
But mostly the midyear is an opportunity to marvel at the fact that, no matter how much music you listen to, you can’t listen to all of it, and some of what you routinely ignore is freaking great. So come join us as we venture into unfamiliar genres. Read about the records you already love, sure, but also check out a few that are way outside your center. It’ll be good for you.
Part 1 runs alphabetically by artist from Angine de Poitrine to Caroline Davis. We’ll have the rest of the alphabet tomorrow in Part 2 and individual writer lists the following day.
Angine de Poitrine — Vol.II (Spectacles Bonzaï )
Who picked it? Ian Mathers.
Did we review it? Yes, Ian wrote, "Precision, abandonment, spectacle; that’s Angine de Poitrine’s second record in a nutshell."
Ray Garraty’s take:
These Canadian mutants draw their origins from two distinct influences. One is Arto Lindsay and his contemporaries; the other is much more recent: the various punk and weirdo rockers who populated underground tape labels in the 2000s. It is difficult to figure out why this band generated so much buzz when similar weirdos still struggle to sell their home-dubbed tapes. Perhaps it is because Angine de Poitrine is cleaner, less punky and more visually oriented (it wasn’t even the music that initially drew attention to them). Still, the album offers 36 minutes of pure fun. It is hard to highlight just one track out of the six; the entire tape is catchy and deserves repeated listens.
Juliana Barwick and Mary Lattimore —Tragic Magic (Infiné)
Who nominated it? Jennifer Kelly
Did we review it? Yes, Ian wrote, “However singular or slightly uncanny their work together seems, one thing that’s much less mysterious is just how good it sounds.”
Christian Carey’s take:
Vocalist/electronic musician Juliana Barwick and harpist Mary Lattimore are a simpatico duo. Barwick’s use of vocal processing and gently wrought electronics matches well with Lattimore’s atmospheric harp playing. Their Infiné recording Tragic Magic embraces the ambient aesthetic while never succumbing to its cliches.
Barwick has a beautiful soprano voice, which in “Perpetual Adoration” is deployed in ethereal overdubs, reveling in reverb. Lattimore responds with cascading arpeggios that swirl around the vocals, both supporting their harmonies and extrapolating from them in nimble passage work. There are some aphoristic selections, like “Temple of the Winds,” where a modal sequence of chords underpins a simple, eloquent vocalise. “Rachel’s Song” features soaring singing and some of Lattimore’s most florid arpeggiations.
Elsewhere, such as on the multilayered yet still ethereal “Stardust,” the music is stretched out, building into multifaceted textures. “A Haze With No Haze” uses successive stacking of loops to good effect. Particularly winning is “The Four Princesses,” which begins with a folk-like melody on the harp that is gradually morphed into syncopated lines and augmented by haloing vocals and mellifluous counter melodies on synths. On the final track, “Melted Moon,” cascading polyrhythms in harp lines create a phase-like rhythmic structure, over which Barwick provides ostinato synth passages. The belated arrival of vocals finds them nimbly fitting into the already detailed musical landscape, with chorused singing leading the music aloft, a stirring valediction to an arresting recording.
Bobbie — Lessons (Orindal)
Who nominated it? Ian Mathers
Did we review it? Yes, Jennifer Kelly wrote, “There’s real pleasure to be had in watching these cuts take shape like pictures in the clouds, the swell of electronic sounds accumulating into melodies, then sputtering out like sparkler trails.”
Christian Carey’s take:
On bobbie’s second full length recording, Lessons, they lean hard into the glistening textures made by an Omnichord, a synth where you make harmonies by pressing a button and then sliding fingers across the “strumplate” found on main body of the instrument, kind of like a Casio crossed with an autoharp. Reverberant guitars, synthesizer drones and delicate singing are also part of the atmosphere, and the session’s engineer, Felix Walworth, adds a judicious dose of drumming to the proceedings. These coalesce beautifully in the song “I Could Call You,” on which strumming and shimmer appear in equal measure. “To My Core I’m a Lover” takes an ambling path through a set of classic pop chord changes, with bobbie earnestly singing a gradually unfurling melody. The title song has a diaphanous cast and a lilting vocal, with the Omnichord providing a seraphic accompaniment. It builds into a yearning chorus of multitracked singing awash in ambient electronics. The final track “I Don’t Wanna Stay” luxuriates in reverb and sustain, with a long-breathed vocal accompanied by distorted Omnichord, guitar and a glockenspiel countermelody.
Boldy James X Rome Streetz — Manhunt (Mass Appeal)
Who nominated it? Ray Garraty
Did we review it? No but Ray has been all over Boldy James in the past.
Jennifer Kelly’s take:
Two veterans of Detroit’s Griselda Collective trade molasses-paced noir-ish narratives, surrounded by a woozy blend of dragging beats, electronic shimmer and old style soul hooks in this brief, between-albums EP. Luxe, decadent violence lurks in the lyrics of “Hot Plate,” doing battle with brutish income inequality; says Boldy, “With Percival on the river, he servin' 'em with inflation/Work for the low, brodie got the chirps and them bitches takin'/Shinin' and they flakin' like the diamonds in my bracelet.“ Throughout, the two mcs drop references to rap forebears and peers, naming Big Daddy Kane and nodding to verses from Nas and Kendrick Lamar. The heartfelt tribute, however, comes up in “Like Biggie Did.” Here lavish soul vocals and spattered rhymes coalesce in genuine, positive affirmation. Says Streetz, “I left it all to faith like Biggie did /Now we so far ahead in this race, ain't no one in this shit.”
Bill Callahan — My Days of 58 (Drag City)
Who picked it? Jonathan Shaw
Did we review it? Yes. Jonathan Shaw wrote, “My Days of 58, Callahan’s new LP, is a return to the sustained unease expressed on a record like Apocalypse, for this listener the highwater mark in the singer’s career."
Ray Garraty’s take:
It’s often said that poetry doesn’t translate well into other languages. It seems age doesn’t translate, either. My Days of 58 is memoiristic and intimate, featuring clearly stated lyrics, and it is heavily preoccupied with thoughts of death. While death is something we all share, our perspectives on it are not universal. Callahan’s view of mortality is distinctly that of an urban white male from artistic circles. This will certainly resonate with some listeners, but isn’t it the aim of art to transcend the differences between us?
Cancer House — The Moth (Motion Ward)
Who Picked It? Tim Clarke
Did We Review It? No
Alex’s take:
In the beginning of “Flowers Over There,” we hear a see-saw sound. I say sound but I really mean there’s something. As in, something see-saws. This is such a cinematic, corporeal record. Bodies emerge from the otherworldly sonics, giving definition to the often muffled, somewhat obscured music. In fact, “Flowers Over There” is a bit of an exception, given the raw rock power of its crescendo. Within the deep folds of the record’s atmosphere, I felt a jolt when the bass bubbles up and the hopeful, progressive guitar rides a strident beat forward. The Moth tends to linger, wandering its fog and bog, but here the music accelerates, building a ragged, undulating wall for the vocalist’s scratched scream to batter against. When I say cinematic and corporeal I mean tactile and formed and visual, full of character. I’m thinking of the banshee synth howling over the morass on “Bloodchimes” and the long, drawn strings of “In My Pocket A Letter, A Red Wrecked Line.” Those strings have a slow, shifting personality, at times mournful and at times a little nauseating in their complaint. Either way, unsettling. The drums are almost spat, which I’ve never thought about drums before. This sort of monstrous presence meant I never quite lay back into the record, despite the aforementioned deep folds. The more literal personification is also notable. The way the strangled, nasal voice on “Waterscene” gets most of the way to vocoded Tom Fec without, to my ears, a vocoder, or how the compressed-to-indecipherable conversation on “Camera Obscura” is at once intimate and intriguing and unreachable. Speaking of monstrous presence, I recently saw the movie Obsession. Besides an array of sinister voices and violent impacts, it shares with The Moth a grim, scrappy artistry in which the effects aren’t high gloss but all the more satisfying and disturbed for it.
Amalie Dahl’s Dafnie EXTENDED — Live at Moldejazz (Sonic Transmission)
Who nominated it? Bill Meyer
Did we review it? No
Jennifer Kelly’s take:
Danish saxophonist and composer Amalie Dahl’s Dafnie was already a large-ish ensemble when it won Danish Music Awards Jazz single of the year in 2024. At its core, it was a quintet comprised of Dahl, Oscar Andreas Haug (trumpet), Jørgen Bjelkerud (trombone), Nicolas Leirtrø (bass) and Veslemøy Narvesen (drums). But for this live performance at one of the oldest jazz festivals in Europe, she expanded her group to include no less than 12 musicians, with multiple acoustic bass players, two drummers, horns, woodwinds and several varieties of keyboards. That sounds like a crowd, but the sound is often lean and focused, for instance. letting silvery chimes and high, metallic keyboards dominate a long passage of “Floating” or focusing intently on the woozy roar of bowed bass at the opening of “Drifting Turning.” Still, the exciting parts are the all-hands bits, such as the bass-thumping, synth-squiggling, drum battering, horn spattered climax of that same cut, which almost literally lifts you up off your feet and carries you off. Bill Meyer would doubtless have more to say about the individual players, but even I recognize the name of Dahl collaborator Ingebrigt Håker Flaten, whose double bass skitters and thuds and rumbles and dances like a very large man who is surprisingly adept at soft shoe. The music cascades and eddies, with different parts taking precedence at different points in the mix. It’s a big, ambitious sound, wildly energetic but always in complete control.
Damaged Bug — ZUZAX (Deathgod Corp)
Who nominated it? Byron Hayes
Did we review it? Yep. Byron wrote, “Vocals, synths and drums form the core of ZUZAX, as [John] Dwyer and his pals pit vintage tech against beefy rhythms.”
Jonathan Shaw’s take:
My sharpest interest in John Dwyer’s continuous cataract of music peaked with Thee Oh Sees’ Warm Slime (2010), a terrific record, and started to peter out when he changed that band’s name for the third or fourth time — who can keep track? I have sometimes felt about his musical output the same way I feel about Karl Ove Knausgaard’s often insufferable books: dude needs an editor. When I have tuned back in to Dwyer’s stuff, here and there I have heard some very good records. A Weird Exits (2016) and Endless Garbage (2021) represent markedly different but effective modes of Dwyer’s creativity that sustain themselves beyond three or four songs. This record, his fifth under the Damaged Bug moniker, includes some of the best elements of listening to Dwyer. ZUZAX has the benefit of hanging together as a record, sounding like a band at work rather than an intractable studio rat at distractable play. I really love “Over-Exposed,” and I really like “Sike Witch” and “End of the War.” The strength of those songs makes misfires like “Man Without a Planet” easier to take. The best tunes here are not equal to Thee Oh Sees’ “I Was Denied,” or even “Plastic Plant,” but they are interesting in their own Damaged Bug sort of way. They often make me want to dance, a useful quality in this shitty, shitty Spring of 2026.
Caroline Davis — Fallows (Ropeadope)
Who nominated it? Christian Carey
Did we review it? Yes, Christian wrote, “Fallows may be conceived for a soloist, but it contains multitudes.”
Bill Meyer’s take:
While I’ve been aware of alto saxophonist Caroline Davis for a couple decades, the overlap between her preferences and mine is small enough that I’d barely written about her before Accept When, her collaboration with Wendy Eisenberg, knocked me off my perch in 2024. This project, the product of a month-long residency in Wyoming, continues Davis’ effort to shake off old habits, and the further she goes, the more I like it. So, her overtly lyrical treatment of “Barbara Allen” is a little too soft-centered for me, but I’m all in with the echocardiogram beat on “Flower Sway.” I don’t know how often I’ll play Fallows moving forward, but it’s heartening to hear an artist push themselves harder this far into their career.
Setting is a trio of multi-instrumentalists: Jaime Fennelly, Nathan Bowles and Joe Westerlund. All are involved in other projects, and their self-titled debut feels like a super group meeting. Playing spot the influences of Setting may not be difficult — minimalism, psych, post/space rock, early electronica, prog — but namechecking styles doesn’t do justice to the stirring amalgam of the aforementioned that buoys their creations. Still, on more than one track I wondered if this is what it would sound like if Steve Reich jammed with Tangerine Dream or Tortoise partied with Delia Derbyshire and Bob Moog. Indeed, there is a bit of the latter fantasy pairing on the album’s opener, “Heard a Bubble,” with a loping ostinato underpinning a swooping monophonic synth solo that has a decidedly Whovian cast. It sets the pacing for the recording at nine minutes in duration, enough to stretch out but not so long as to take up a whole album side with a single composition.
Similarly, “Gum Bump” is just shy of eight minutes in duration. It has a funky bass-driven groove as its underpinning, with nimble keyboard solos strewn along its path. “What Kind of Fish is a Turtle” features tubular bells and a sustained drone, subsequently augmented by imposing slabs of sliding sine tones. “Ribbon of Moss” has a plaintive melody, first played in a guitar chord solo and later taken up in the electronics end of the activities, which also contain a wide range of varied timbres in suave accompaniment figurations. The piece closes with the tune returning, this time in the bass register, a nod towards post-rock, particularly TNT.
Setting closes with “Derring - Do,” on which syncopated rhythms and morse code repeated notes offset swelling synths. A second part sees the drumming tick up and the repeated note pattern proliferate into several layers of interwoven motives. Partway through is an oasis where sustained tones come to the fore, followed by another passage reasserting guitar and percussion. The balance moves between these two demeanors, eventually ceding to a gradual denouement of held tones that create a web of harmonies. Setting’s recording is engaging from start to finish. A favorite among the first half of 2026’s releases.
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In the press interviews leading up to the release of Tiger’s Blood, Katie Crutchfield’s latest for Anti under the artist name Waxahatchee, the artist made it clear that she wanted to step away from the tortured artist model of creation and reception. The songs and themes explored move further away from the edginess of Out in the Storm, a cathartic but harrowing effort from 2017. In this sense, it follows the thread of her 2020 recording Saint Cloud. As on that album, Brad Cook produces, at Sonic Ranch Studios in Texas. The sound blooms; Tiger’s Blood is the most polished of Crutchfield’s albums to date.
An excellent group of supporting musicians are on hand. The guitarist MJ Lenderman navigates the delicate balance of acoustic and electric instruments with a clean electric sound, and economic, skilful solos. The songs are further fleshed out by banjoist Phil Cook, Brad’s brother, and drummer Spencer Tweedy.
Crutchfield has a glorious voice that has only improved with experience. When I reviewed Plains, her duo project with Jess Williamson, for Dusted, I remarked that, “Crutchfield and Williamson singing together create magic.” Magic is created by voices here too. There are few songs where the lead vocal isn’t accompanied by backing vocals: overdubs of Crutchfield and help from her collaborators. A song like “Evil Spawn” has an excellent hook, but the incorporation of multiple background singers really makes its arrangement attractive. “3 Sisters,” appropriately, over the course of the song builds to 3-part harmony. The title track and album closer gets help from a chorus of enthusiastic voices.
Songs like “Ice Cold” and “Bored” bring the music closer to the rock end of the country music spectrum, a popular place currently to reside. Crutchfield’s attachment to roots music is also on display, with “Right Back at It” spotlighting Phil Cook and pedal steel adorning “Crimes of the Heart.”
True to Crutchfield’s word, Tiger’s Blood is an album that avoids bathos. That doesn’t mean that strong emotions are absent. In “Burns Out at Midnight,” she confronts angry impulses. “365,” one of the album’s singles, is about a toxic relationship. She sings,”I catch your poison arrow, I catch your same disease, Bowing like a weeping willow, Buckling at the knees, Begging you please.” “Crime of the Heart,” about another devolving relationship, rhymes the title with,”you’ll rip yourself apart.” The music denies any sense of wallowing, even sounds upbeat, suggesting that this relationship may be in the rearview mirror soon enough.
Tiger’s Blood doesn’t have a weak cut on it. One imagines it will be in heavy rotation for many long after its release.
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Third Coast Percussion — Standard Stoppages (Cedille)
Nominated for two Grammys, Third Coast Percussion’s recording Standard Stoppages was part of the group’s twentieth anniversary celebrations. The group has long advocated for contemporary classical music, commissioning projects that have done a great deal to expand the repertoire for percussion ensembles. Standard Stoppages consists entirely of new works made by collaborators old and new to TCP.
Jlin is best known for her footwork output, but recently she has been working with artists in other genres. Please Be Still is a brief, charming work that translates footwork into percussion ensemble music, moving electronica signatures into the realm of acoustic instruments.
Tigran Hamasayan fully embraces mallet instruments in his Sonata for Percussion, with patterning of folk melodies creating vibrant shimmering timbres. Cast in three movements, “Memories From Childhood,” “Hymn,” and “23 for TCP,” the sonata was clearly tailor made for the group, and their assured performance underscores this spirit of collaboration.
Zakir Hussain wrote Murmurs in Time, his only piece for classical percussion ensemble, for TCP. Tabla playing is featured prominently on the recording. Hussain recently passed away, and the work honors his legacy as a virtuoso performer and creative artist and gives the listener a poignant glimpse at what could have been a more extended, fruitful collaboration with TCP.
Jessie Montgomery’s Study No. 1 uses a diverse range of instruments, successively foregrounding different subsections. There is a sense of inquisitiveness in this heterogenous deployment. Montgomery focuses more on melodic and harmonic details than textural variety in In Color Suite.
Musekiwa Chingodza’s buoyant singing voice is featured on his piece Dzoka Kumba Referencing Zimbabwean traditional music, Chingodza’s mbira (thumb piano) playing is underlaid with syncopated polyrhythms from a drum set, mallets, and metallophone instruments. It is a stirring close to a multifaceted, eminently satisfying recording.
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As previously mentioned, one of the things that came about after Dusted mainstay Jennifer Kelly's cancer diagnosis was a Bandcamp compilation in her honour. Per Jenny's wishes it is free to listen and download to; details (and links to most of the contributors) are all over on the Bandcamp page. Thanks to everyone who contributed (including several Dusted comrades), and everyone who listens.
(There was also an amazing benefit concert for Jenny recently, you can see some pictures on the Dusted Instagram, for example here.)
Pan•American — Fly the Ocean in a Silver Plane (Kranky)
An aura of motion pervades Mark Nelson’s latest album, as rhythms shimmer and electronic (or electronically altered) sounds sparkle like broken glass. When I reviewed 2022’s The Patience Fader, I observed that, “Pan•American slows time to a liquid crawl,” but this latest set of songs nudges the clock forward subtly. “Entrance to Afterlife” booms with the album’s most emphatic drumming, a marching band just out of earshot as ecstatic synth washes surge and recede. Yet drum rhythms chitter and glitch through even the most ambient, atmospheric cuts here, jabbing “Heaven’s Waiting Room” with an elbow, hissing and popping through “Silver Tramway (In Snow)” to keep things moving.
That’s perhaps in line with Nelson’s statement that he wrote these songs about travel. He says he means both ordinary, physical travel (of the “get in the van, man” variety) as well as more metaphorical life journeys. Still, you have to sense the balance tipping towards the mystical when three of the ten track titles refer to the afterlife (and four if you count “Taxi to the Terminal Gate”). This last one is full of long, lucid sounds, some breathy and organic and wood wind like, others polished to an electronic gleam; a subtly clicking, scratching rhythm ticks on through all this, as water washes through in big splashes.
Mallory Linnehan, who performs as Chelsea Bridge, is the only other musician besides Nelson on this album. You can hear her violin in “Silver Plane, Now Boarding,” a mournful, Celtic skirl, rough as wool against the pristine hyper-reality of the guitar and electronics. Her voice turns up in “Death Cleaning” alongside Nelson’s in a lovely murmuring interval, introspective and dream-like.
Yet it is mostly Nelson, pushing past his normal slow-blooming, guitar atmospherics into a lighter, brighter, more electric future. It is mostly pretty subtle, but effective at higher doses, too, as in the punching, rolling, Talk Talk-by-way-of-Adrian-Sherwood, “Entrance to Afterlife.” It sure doesn’t sound like Pan•American, but oh boy, it moves.
