![]() The longest number, exceeding eight minutes, fluid A Lenticular Slap finds the balance free jazz improvisation and folk song. Swinging from major to minor, the musical palette combines intricate brushstrokes a-la pointillist art. A passage, where guitar and keyboard join forces in rollicking arpeggio, presents to the mind rays of the sun as if they suddenly pierced the gloomy texture of a nimbostratus. The multipart composition absorbs the listener into a sonically elaborate realm. Musically, Striking Down Your Big Premiere sets the course for the prog-inclined journey. The opening track, Striking Down Your Big Premiere, starts with a baffling metaphor: “If I could wear a capsule / Of all the world’s hairline fracture / The biggest wig in the show.” Yet, the tone is light-hearted, the mood is vibrant and tranquil at once. With bizarrely enigmatic lyrics, the musician often throws the gauntlet to his listener to go down the rabbit hole of thoughts. The droll and poetic nature of Walker’s songs is perfectly delivered in this setting. The unity that brings to mind Tim Buckley’s Happy Sad and, expectedly, overtones of Tortoise, particularly on Axis Bent. The transparency that makes all parts sonically distinct, keyboards that with the light touch of McEntire add another dimension to Walker’s guitar. McEntire’s producer credit summons up a certain archetype of sound which is indeed present on the record. ![]() Questioning himself on the second track Rang Dizzy, Walker seemingly provides the album as an answer: “I sat in the lawn wondering “should I dose again”? / Or just break into song with Illinois flowers.” Recorded with a fellow Chicago-born producer John McEntire, Course in Fable feels like a peaceful homecoming for the artist, both in the literal and metaphorical sense. Entitled Looking/Seeing, it seems to speak of finding order in chaos – one of the underlying themes of the record. It features an abstract painting by American artist Jenny Nelson – the work which is emblematic of the record’s beguiling complexity. The sound texture of Course In Fable feels as transparent and multilayered as the pastel-coloured cover. Still, the comparison with fine art is congruous. Following two collaborative albums – a psych-folk ‘diptych’ Deep Fried Grandeur and atmospheric watercolour-ish Little Common Twist, this work feels more elaborate and less impressionistic. Another Bandcamp holiday is upon us, the least you can do is give some love to this near-perfect documentation of mind-fry goodness.With a hint of moral storytelling in its title, Course In Fable is the first LP in three years, featuring Walker’s original material. This performance proves essential for both KM fans and collectors of Ryley’s ever-growing pieces of his live improv pantheon. Sometimes the best phrase is already cast. Molten wax guitars, percolating sweat rhythms, sonic symbiosis and, well as the band so succinctly puts it - deep fried grandeur. The pieces are truly two halves of a whole experience, the time needed to flip is just a breath between sonic sculptures, haunted and hungry. There are no surges of applause, no banter, just the assembled players finding their way around the cosmic cloud for a touch under an hour. With Cooper Crain mixing it down in Chicago post performance, the record quite honestly bears few hallmarks of a live record. This is exactly the argument for live records done right. The Utrecht festival boasts a long history of collaboration and genre-defining/defying performances, and the meeting of Walker and Kikagaku Moyo on the stage is a performance that practically beged to be documented, pressed and pondered. ![]() The set on Deep Fried Grandeur was recorded live at Le Guess Who? in 2018. As Ryley’s Husky Pants label continues to bloom into a fertile ground for experimentation, here it becomes a necessary hub of documention some of the guitarist’s historical high water marks as well.
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