A Split

This fascinating release on Brooklyn’s tiny Shake Your Leaves imprint features two of the borough’s most talented yet overlooked musicians trading acoustic tunes over a brief EP. Baldwin and Extra Life leader Charlie Looker studied together at Wesleyan University, attending classes by experimental luminaries like Anthony Braxton and Alvin Lucier, but though each of these artists demonstrates a thorough mastery of theory and composition, the music included here is decidedly more approachable than that of their erstwhile tutors. Baldwin, an upright bassist whose fiercely bowed chords support quavering vocal melodies, favors a spare, confessional style that might remind one of some of the more singer songwriter oriented work of Arthur Russell or even the swooning melodrama of Morrissey, while Looker favors rigorous achromatic melodies that recall both medieval plainsong and the folk balladry of Susan Collins. Extra Life’s “Black Hoodie” an analysis of childhood insecurities set to a troubadour's tune, is easily the standout of the set.