Ryley Walker – Course In Fable
Husky Pants – 2 April 2021
Live acts don’t tend to come much better than Ryley Walker. Catching him on 2017’s Golden Sings That Have Been Sung tour, fans could see the guitar virtuoso evolve in real-time, as the American primitive and British folk stylings so effortlessly evoked on his first two albums gave way to some surprisingly leftfield undercurrents. His symbiotic interplay with long time collaborator Bill MacKay saw the band relying heavily on improvisation, as they began to experiment with post-rock and free jazz, pushing their stage shows to dizzying new heights.
After one of the performances, Ryley Walker signed a poster for me and penned ‘Avoid bad drugs’ above his autograph. From my impression of the Illinois native from his slacker shtick and droll twitter commentary, caught off guard I assumed it was a joke I wasn’t wise to. It was only later when he opened up publicly about his struggles with addiction that it registered. So, three years on from the fraught, contemplative mood of Deafman Glance and the most hopeless period of the songwriter’s life, where do we find Walker? In a career defined by reinvention, Course In Fable, self-released on his Husky Pants imprint is a bold, batshit masterstroke the likes of which we’ve never seen.
Imagine yourself in a Midwestern state towards the end of the twentieth century. Somehow, you’re tuning into various college radio and classic rock stations with curious ease: first there’s a little Joni, then Steely Dan, new wave, Pink Floyd, maybe even some no wave, Zappa or something off Jagged Little Pill. String it together and that’s the vibe on Walker’s fifth LP of original material. The man himself is cool calling it ‘Genesis Cos-play’ and iTunes labels it prog-fucking-rock. Regardless of how you categorise it, it’s an obvious, irreverent departure in sound from the off. Chicagoan heavy weight John McEntire (of Tortoise and the Sea and Cake) was on production duties this time aroundand his influence is quickly recognisable. Famed for his work with The Red Krayola, Stereolab and The High Llamas, McEntire has a deep understanding of the sonic palette, and part of the record’s lush, full-bodied finish is thanks to him.
The ceremonial grandeur of Striking Your Big Premier opens. Exuberant flourishes roll into a Mr Bunglesque carousel loop, before settling into a verse that finds Walker weaving between a Tony Levin inspired bassline, as he sings, “If I could wear a capsule / Of all the world’s hairline fracture / The biggest wig in the show.” The songsets a few precedents for the rest of the album early on: lyrically Walker’s operating at peak surrealist humour; time sigs and grooves deviate wildly; the musicianship is staggering, and tracks look to be clocking in roughly around the five-minute mark. The musicians behind Walker, pulling everything off with panache are: Bill MacKay (guitar/piano), Ryan Jewell (drums) and Andrew Scott Young (bass/piano). Listeners are in safe hands with this close-knit ensemble, their assured, spontaneous feel guaranteed to keep you hooked and guessing throughout.
Rang Dizzy, the first single released, slides in on Robert Kirby strings (arranged by Douglas Jenkins of the Portland Cello Project) as the vocal melody skims over busy kit work, reminiscent of Dave Mattacks. Just like the abstract cover art (courtesy of Jenny Nelson) Walker’s wordplay proves equally expressionistic. In the way one might build a fleeting impression of the world as glimpsed through a passenger side window, back-alley slang, billboard jargon and ‘blue-collar psychogeography’ create a fractured tableau of road-weary, offbeat poetry. “I sat in the lawn wondering – should I dose again? / Or just break into song with Illinois flowers” spills Walker at the song’s close. Even though his personal insights are oblique, it doesn’t make them any less tender or revelatory.
Dreamlike passages like “I paint smog in the sky with a horsetail comb” and “I extend my hand to all probable possibilities / That I may be baptized in seltzer from glaciers” offer a touch of figurative lightness, counteracting Course’s more self-deprecating moments. That said, the chorus of Clad With Bunk reads like it could go either way: “I was due disaster in Driggs somehow I didn’t fall of / I would like to think I was saved by the way / the sun gets better in the flatlands / Man is better buried there” Heard in context, however, afloat on swathes of sunlit guitar, it’s exultant. Walker’s measured delivery seems stronger than ever, surpassing even the climactic reaches of The Roundabout and In Castle Dome. And that’s before the muscular, Americana chug of the outro kicks in.
The other more song-centric tracks on the album, Axis Bent and Shiva With Dustpan, are further examples of Walker’s best writing to date. Ryley recently shared that the NYC spring breeze of Axis, which wears its Countdown To Ecstasy and Pretzel Logic influences proudly on its sleeve, is a prize representation of the direction he’d next like to take his music. Promising news for fans. Later Shiva sashays in with a country-rock limp and a bloodshot third eye, wincing like it’s the morning after. The title alone is ingenious, picturing a multi-limbed deity wielding a range of cleaning utensils. The chorus harks back to the psych-folk haze of Walker’s early days, marrying his older inspirations with Course’s weirder, unexpected trajectory.
And if it’s weird you’re after, the through-composed A Lenticular Slap and Pond Scum Ocean won’t disappoint. Embracing his Chicago roots, Walker channels Gastr Del Sol and Tortoise (props again to McEntire) actually recalling David Grubbs at times. …Slap is a joyride in and of itself. It slaps… albeit in a fitful, utterly bizarre way, unravelling like a David Foster Wallace stream of consciousness, before switching from Gentle Giant to a happy-go-lucky, almost reggae lilt. …Ocean’s another standout, a Kid A/Pat Metheny malfunction, splayed across an intricate bed of textural fizz.
It’s unlikely we’ll see a return to gigging for Walker anytime soon unless it’s supporting Phil Collins & co. But with Husky Pants dropping albums of this calibre, who’s complaining? With Album of the Year potentially within arm’s reach, the reconciled, sprawling imagination of Course In Fable is proving to be the latter-day folkjokeopus we never knew we needed.
Order via Bandcamp: https://ryleywalker.bandcamp.com/album/course-in-fable
Photo Credit: Emma Smith