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Ryley walker review1/13/2024 ![]() For others, this will serve as another release to make fans scratch their heads, but these multipart songs move into enough unexpected places to keep you returning for more helpings. Some will hanker for his lusher, warmer material of old but those days are long gone. The final track here, Pharaoh’s Plastic is exuberant and joyful, with guitars growling away in a very prog-rock way. It’s a distinct improvement though, this one is beautifully recorded with plenty of actual melody. Second Strand is similarly obtuse with lots of different parts to it that don’t seem to join up. Trace Ghosts is a messy track, wobbling around with all kinds of discordant bits thrown in he is in danger of disappearing up his ass here. The first track, So Certain Tall Tales, is definitely cut from the same cloth, with clean, ringing electric guitars going into unusual places and Walker’s vocals lurching along behind them. This new EP will please anyone who enjoyed his last full-length solo album Course In Fable. Gone is the overall dark tone that surrounded Deafman Glance and in its place the guitar strums bring enlightenment and exciting anticipation for what is next.Having started out as a retro folk musician, Ryley Walker’s sound has become a lot less predictable, and at times a lot less accessible. Not only is he producing high level output but you can hear the healing on every track. Clearly, we can all celebrate that Walker is still with us. When you add in the excellent guitar work from the talented Bill MacKay, drumming of Ryan Jewell and producer/engineer John McEntire (Tortoise, the Sea and Cake) this record is as technically sound as you could want.Ī new look on life can always be the catalyst for something special. It is a seamless transition in the song that is effortless and confident which sums up most of the album. “Clad With Bunk” is one of my favorite songs as it has such a smooth and polite open but then its last two minutes changes the tempo and rocks out. The opening “Striking Down Your Big Premiere” has so many excellent twists and turns with Walker’s confident vocals steering the song. ![]() He has a couple tracks here that push by the 7 minute mark which give plenty of canvas to work but the 5 minute runtime is his sweet spot for songs on Course In Fable. Course In Fable is a record that successfully takes what has made Walker the artist he is today and uses those experiences to create an album that is one of his best to date. Walker comes off here masterful at his trade as he shows off his guitar skills with song arrangements that are artful, prog like, psychedelic and back to the basics from his earlier years. Walker’s fifth solo album Course In Fable could take us anywhere but now with a new appreciation and look on life this album actually feels like a natural progression right down to the cover art. That is a very eclectic tour especially when you consider that his 2015 album, Primrose Green, was mostly built around a 70’s folk singer/songwriter sound. In March his second album Primrose Green emerged to critical hosannas from the likes of NPR. Musically, he released a cover record of Dave Matthews Band’s The Lillywhite Sessions in 2018, had another instrumental record with jazz musician Charles Rumback in 2019 called Little Common Twist and then released the excellent jam record with Kikagaku Moyo earlier this year in Deep Fried Grandeur. The preceding years have been extraordinary for Ryley Walker. ![]() Ryley Walker has walked an interesting musical path since his last solo release of Deafman Glance in 2018 but more importantly he is celebrating a new beginning of sorts in 2021 with sobriety after a long time of addiction and a suicide attempt in 2019.
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