About Me
This is the new church music.
Though not religious at least, not in any conventional sense -- The Late Cords debut EP, Lights from the Wheelhouse, is certainly prayerful, a deep, contemplative blend of the acoustic and electronic, the traditional and experimental, the lyrical and abstract. Here, a slow, simmering organ shares the space with a jack-in-the-box thumb piano, crackly synth loops and incantatory choruses. There, a tentative guitar and droning organ frame the mood for a world-weary voice while electronic droplets patter like moisture in an abandoned building.
The dual nature and strange coherence of The Late Cord arent surprising, considering its members, John-Mark Lapham and Micah P. Hinson, are each from completely different musical backgrounds but share the same birthplace the stifling, arid West Texas town of Abilene.
Lapham recently has broken onto the cross-Atlantic indie scene as the sounds-and-samples whiz in Manchesters the Earlies, an experimental, acoustic-electronic group in its own right, albeit a blissed-out, orchestral pop juggernaut of room-shaking choruses and acid-trip vamps. (The bands debut, These Were the Earlies, was released in 2004 on 679 Records and last year in the US on Secretly Canadian.)
Hinson, the youngest son of a devoutly Christian househould, found his way into an errant lifestyle of addiction, bankruptcy, homelessness, trouble with the law over prescription forgery and, eventually, intense songwriting. Now, Hinson, still young at just 24, is making a name for himself as a Leonard Cohen-esque singer-songwriter. Hes toured the US and Europe and earned favorable reviews for both the Baby ep and his 2005 Sketchbook release, Micah P. Hinson and the Gospel of Progress. His gritty, emotionally bare folk sound is quite a contrast to the Earlies crashing, playful, mysterious rock, but, if anything, Lights from the Wheelhouse proves that inspiration always trumps differences.
Though John-Mark and Micah grew up within ten miles of each other, they didnt meet until 1999. They were introduced by a mutual friend named Brandon Carr, who had helped Hinson record his first album, The Baby and the Satellite, and who would go on to become lead singer with the Earlies. Carr and Lapham had been renting several tiny, secluded rooms in the basement of a mostly empty 1960s office building in Abilenes historic downtown. This secret recording studio was a primitive underground incubator, stocked with a computer, some microphones and Laphams hoard of bizarre, garage-sale electronic gizmos. The smell of Mexican food wafted down from the courtyard burrito joint in the afternoon, and at night, a small circle of musicians laid tracks on a diverse array of projects.
One of these jams, a whimsical collaboration solely between Lapham and Hinson, became the dark, somnolent seed for The Late Cord.
I gave [Micah] a three-minute track of a simple, droning bass loop, which he miraculously took away and devised a full set of lyrics for, Lapham remembers. This hit me hard it was so close to the same mood and feel of the sort of emotional, sedating sounds I grew up with from labels such as 4AD.
The two continued recording together, producing fragmentary tracks either from sudden inspiration or from song ideas Hinson had been working on. Lapham took these bits and pieces with him to England, working on them between Earlies sessions. Lapham helped his friend score a deal at Sketchbook right around the time the Earlies were taking off, but he never gave up work on The Late Cord, and when the opportunity came for the Earlies to do a remix of a Rachel Goswell song, Lapham leapt at the chance to bring 4ADs attention to his and Hinsons side project.
Lights from the Wheelhouse is the initial result, and with any luck, a full-length will follow. Hinson and Lapham go all-out multi-instrumental on the record, with John-Mark holding down organs, synthesizers, bells, tape recordings, space echo, loops and programming; and Micah handling vocals, guitars, banjo, mandolin, upright piano, Casio, a salvation army organ, thumb piano, blow tuner, synthesizer, harmonica, toy accordion, trap set and samples.
Believe it or not, the finished sound is surprisingly simplistic and almost devotional in character as each song begins with a latent urgency that reveals itself gradually through repetition and the adding on of parts. Hinsons voice becomes the records protagonist, an intoxicating, gravely baritone steeped in resignation and longing, sometimes so weighed down it manifests itself in just a chilling moan, a cold wind carrying the distant sounds of the duos production.
The Late Cord receives additional help on their first EP from cellist Semay Wu (on the haunting Chains/Strings) and harmonica player Henry da Massa (on the even more haunting Hung on the Cemetery Gates), both of whom played on Hinsons Gospel of Progress. The extra-special guest on the record is John-Marks father, Robert H. Lapham, who, in the 1950s in Lubbock, Texas, played in Buddy Hollys first backing band, the Picks. The elder Lapham lends ominous, distinctly un-Peggy Sue-like chants to the EPs staggering centerpiece, My Most Meaningful Relationships are with Dead People.
With these two musicians individual careers taking off so rapidly, its a miracle that Lights from the Wheelhouse even happened. And its a good thing it did, because this short recording holds enough weight and beauty to last the rest of the year. Dont miss out on this remarkable new release from 4AD and two of the most exciting and adventurous new voices in independent music.
