Weekly Release Spotlight: Magnolia Electric Co.
Posted on 8/02/2009
Magnolia Electric Co.
Josephine
[Secretly Canadian]
Depression and country music used to go hand in hand, before pickup truck anthems and drunken jingoism steered so many away from the genre, and it was a beautiful thing. The songwriters sounded like genuine, broken hearts caterwauling over dusty notes and wheel wagon rhythms. Jason Molina has always been the contemporary go-to guy, whether recording his own name, Songs: Ohia, or his arguably most ambitious outfit yet, Magnolia Electric Co., for proving wrong that old axiom that "you can’t recreate the past," because he does so here in spades (soiled, rusty spades encrusted in toil and worry, but spades all the same).
And this time the folk-country wear and tear ethic is attributed to a real life tragedy: the death of the band's bassist Even Farrell, which occurred right as the songs for this, the band's third album, were being written. It gives the whole listening experience a more intense weightiness, for sure, but it also, almost ironically, makes it that much more stark and serene. There's a calm airiness billowing about in every track, including both the minimally-orchestrated ("Whip-Poor-Will") and the passionately robust ("Little Sad Eyes"), that leaves room for the hurt that creeps up in Molina's lyrics and weathered voice. Even flourishes that would otherwise be called decorative, like the soul-crushing saxophone solo in "O! Grace" or back-up chorus in "An Arrow in the Gale", instead come off as piercingly downtrodden, adding to the harrowing journey of the album's protagonist.
If this all sounds like an existential Western film where the hero eggs the reaper on and the girl is never got, you wouldn't be too far off. Possibly the most affective trait of Josephine is the reprisal of Molina bellowing "Oh, Josephine!" over drop-tuned chords in the climaxes of multiple of the album's songs. It not only gives the album a cinematic quality, it straight up sounds like musical weeping. Cash, Guthrie, and the folk-country greats of yesteryear may grumble about a lot of things happening in 2009 if they were still with us, but the immaculate sun-drenched sorrow of Magnolia Electric Co.'s latest would certainly not be one of them.
Stream: Magnolia Electric Co. - Little Sad Eyes
Radio K presents Magnolia Electric Co. on August 7th at the 7th Street Entry.
Written by Chris Polley, Radio K volunteer.