Singing Ax

Anyone familiar with Josh Tillman knows that he’s been recording beautifully melancholic solo material for years before playing drums for Fleet Foxes. The stark “Three Sisters” is lengthy folk dirge that sets the tone with Tillman crooning in a trembling voice over threadbare acoustic guitar. Throughout the song his strumming hand also keeps a slowed heartbeat tempo by tapping out the time on the guitar’s body. A third of the way in, drums and cymbals crash down as a sublime string section bleeds into the mix. With religious imagery and mentions of primitive mechanics, Tillman seems to be channeling ghosts of the Great Depression. The beautifully dark “Diamondback” would well accompany the Joad family’s desperate quest from Oklahoma to California in Steinbeck’s The Grapes Of Wrath, while the protagonist of “One Task” keeps to his familial responsibilities in the face of foreboding doom. The title-track further questions the point of existence with a gossamer gloom.