Released: | 7/10/2022 |
Condition: | New |
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BONNY LIGHT HORSEMAN - ROLLING GOLDEN HOLY
Price:
€16.99
Format: Compact Disc
Availability:
Immediate Dispatch
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A // 1/ Exile (3:34)
2/ Comrade Sweetheart (3:33)
3/ California (3:16)
4/ Summer Dream (5:21)
5/ Gone by Fall (2:49)
B // 6/ Sweetbread (3:41)
7/ Someone to Weep for Me (3:21)
8/ Fleur de Lis (4:24)
9/ Once on Another Day (3:24) - VINYL ONLY
10/ Fair Annie (3:01)
11/ Cold Rain and Snow (2:48)
Bonny Light Horsemans self titled debut was a folk
masterclass, reimagining centuries-old standards with
effortless grace and wonder. Those Grammy-nominated, listtopping recordings not only suggested renewed possibilities
for aging songbooks but also marked the arrival of a trio
fully capable of reorienting the wider folk landscape. Still, if
it felt at all like the work of some short-lived supergroup or a
one-off diversion (it never was), Rolling Golden Holy rebuffs
the notion with preternatural beauty and charm, and
imagination. These songs, all originals, follow the paths of
the traditional tunes the band cherishes to new frontiers, the
sounds and situations of history given the gravity and shape
of now. This is a band working at the edge of modern folk.
After the release of their debut, Anaïs Mitchell, Josh
Kaufman, and Eric D. Johnson began discussing their next
steps, loosely planning on writing and recording stints. Those
sessions were delayed for all the unpredictable but nowfamiliar reasons until the Spring of 2021, when the trio
reconvened with their families in tow in upstate New York.
Their chemistry remained intact. Johnson's wife Annie had
listened to him work with dozens of collaborators over the
decades, but, listening in from one room over, she noted he'd
never seemed so at ease and productive as he was with
Kaufman and Mitchell in Woodstock. They were perfecting
“California,” a timely and incorruptible classic about moving
on in search of something else, something more. These
sessions were a series of “yes, and” encounters, each one
encouraging the others to take an idea and run with it further
to the new safety net they've built together, for one another.
These songs continually suggest and embody an unspoken
continuum between traditional and modern folk. Mitchell
finds self-sustaining adoration in steamy backseats, nighttime
visions, and seasonal storms during “Summer Dream,”
crisscrossing generational symbols to tie past, present, and
future into a Gordian knot of devotion. Johnson reaches back
to 19th-century wartime on “Someone to Weep for Me” to
empathize with someone else descended from “a long line of
nobodies,” just trying to live long enough to feel like he's
mattered to anyone at all, a notion that knows neither age nor
border. Johnson and Mitchell trade lines on “Exile,” their
luminous response to another of humanity's eternal
conundrums—how to revel in relationships that we know
will one day leave us lonely. Love and loss, death and fear:
the songs may be different, but the emotional sources remain.
The band thrives in rendering fresh wisdom and insight from
old models, whether scraps of ancient songs or the spark of
entwined voices. Theirs is a space created for sharing,
learning, singing, and playing as one. Rolling Golden Holy is
the band's testament to partnership and trust at a moment
when we crave such connections so much. They fully
appreciate what they have found in one another. On Rolling
Golden Holy, we get to live inside that magic, too.
Rock/Pop
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