Marisa Anderson & William Tyler – Lost Futures
Thrill Jockey – 27 August 2021
The devastating effects of the pandemic have helped Marisa Anderson & William Tyler, two singular voices in instrumental guitar music, come together perhaps sooner than expected. One can assume that its influence is present in this project’s concept and title. To base an album around the cultural theory (of the same name from Mark Walker) that once inevitable hopes and ideals have now been at best interrupted is in itself telling, and these highly creative players have packed Lost Futures with an appropriately diverse and shifting set of songs, using repetition, space, peace and alarm across forty minutes.
This use of repetition on songs like Pray for Rain is interesting in its evocation of quiet despair. The tune is built on a fairly simple but neatly played pattern of mid-range notes delivered at a leisurely pace throughout the whole song, which, along with sounds like the melancholy viola and electric guitar shimmers, help build a hazy and woozy image of weariness and fatigue. Amping up the drama is Something will Come, which uses baritone guitar and bass, along with a resilient drum line to create a low, urgent repetitive soundscape, more driving and clamorous than its title would suggest.
The mid-section of the album finds it at its most overtly anxious, although there are suggestions throughout. Life and Casualty is beautiful in its simplicity, using electric and acoustic guitar to frame a catchy tune, but there is still uneasiness buried in the prettiness, especially towards the end when Marisa’s acoustic playing drives forward. It adds texture to the song whilst differentiating it from pieces like the title track, the only completely acoustic one here, which is purer in its construction and mood. Lost Futures is the album’s shortest song by a minute, and its most spacious and light. Its use of just one steel and one nylon string guitar results in a pure duo piece that relies upon a gorgeously gentle melody and some niftily played scales to build an image of brightness overcoming shade.
Just as effective but with a healthy dose of menace is Hurricane Light, another duo song, with Marisa back on nylon string guitar and William picking a Telecaster. This one has the feeling of a modern Western film soundtrack about it, with added humidity from the thick electric guitar notes. It has a killer Tarantino-esque hook running through it that brings drama, while Marisa’s nylon string notes are lovely. Haunted by Water completes a more relaxed second half, with rich electric guitar notes supported by subtle bass and acoustic guitar. At nearly nine minutes, this one is easily the longest here and takes its time to open out, with the drums absent for the first three minutes. Marisa’s melody playing is the driving force behind much of it, but the weird interlude at two minutes, hinting at the same shift around six, gives this one an eerie dimension that adds depth. It is an example of the sort of confidence that these two musicians have in their work that is well demonstrated throughout this finely composed and beautifully performed album.