William Tyler

also worth noting that Chuck Johnson's last record Velvet Arc covers some of the same territory as Tyler ... really wonderful record.

^^ thank you for mentioning it, love Chuck and keep meaning to check it out

'Kingdom of Jones'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDV2tJI3CMU

Got this in the mail today and have just put it on now.

'Highway Anxiety': holy hell, this is gonna be good.

Yeah, this album is fantastic.

Sublime.

It sounds wonderful on the first listen. I'm gonna have another listen later after a smoke.

this is a pretty good shadowfax album

i wish shadowfax actually sounded like this

ha, yeah, maybe i haven't heard the right shadowfax? there are definitely some proggy moments on Modern Country, but I dunno if it's overtly 'fax-y.

i like it, it just feels kinda safe and new age-y. maybe i got too excited after the rother cover on lost colony

Ha, there's nothing even remotely new age-y about Modern Country.

This is gorgeous. Perfect wake-up music.

this is really great.

that's my four-word review.

This is easily in my three favourite albums of the year, I love how it's a country record, an ambient record and a sort of post-rock record all at once, except way more melodically engaging than that implies.

I've been craving really gentle music over the last few weeks so it's been getting a lot of play in my house.

Yep, it's a total winner. Didn't know if he would be able to follow up Impossible Truth given the high quality of that album, but he somehow managed.

ya rly enjoying this but like i said in the folk/fahey thread

if you like this do your yrself a favour and hunt down loose furs first album bc it has a similar vibe tho its a bit more noisier with some freakouts

This reminds me so much of Michael Rother solo stuff like Flammende Herzen. Warm, melodic, romantic and metaphysical at the same time. Album of the year from what I have heard - which is not a lot - up till now.

Yeah, 'Highway Anxiety' in particular has strong Rother vibes.

http://thirdmanstore.com/tmr-live/live-12-series/william-tyler-live-at-third-man-records-12?___SID=U
Live at Third Man Records to be released at the end of this month. Recorded in 2014 (short review here), it contains an early version of "Gone Clear", then called "Going Clear". Curious to hear how he pulls that one off acoustically.

yeah this is really nice

This snuck in at 57th out of 57 (so far) in my big secret albums of the year list, indicating that I liked it just enough to consider it a good album. Will definitely give it another go at some point

Any other music by not-Kurt Lambchop people worth exploring?

New album Goes West out January 2019. First available track sounds great but feels a little too comfy maybe... Bill Frisell guests on the album closer!
https://youtu.be/br4BRG_RXO0

count me in!

lovely song, I like the concise approach

Preordered.

Lovely listen.

new album is out

Mine came in the mail on Wednesday, but I have not done the digital download yet, so I've not listened (no internet on my PC at the new place, so I'm stuck downloading to an external drive and handling things from there).

It came with a CD that has eight extra tracks. Gonna finish a new recording this evening and then dig in.

Excited.

I've made some utterly unfair judgments based on the tracklist alone: I like rambling, drifting Tyler best of all and this is made up of short tracks.

This is super mellow and super good.

The bonus disc is called Dispatches from Echo Magic and is mostly made up of demos of songs on the album. It's nice.

I was oblivious to this preorder only bonus disc thing now I feel like I'm missing out!

Was really digging “Venus in Aquarius,” wish there was a little more variation like that on the album but it’s all very nice.

Evan, I will share Dispatches, if you are interested. It's good if you REALLY like Goes West and want more.

The more I listen to this, the more I like it. It's easily his accessible work yet, but there is an ethereal, yet undeniably bright, timbre to the whole thing that just doesn't sound like anything else he's ever done. There is an irreverent, but melancholy, mood to it that makes it sound like it's being beamed in from an alternate mid-1970s. A place where John Fahey and Leo Kottke are the ultimate rock stars and Blood on the Tracks actually saved Bob Dylan and his marriage. The only bad news is from the past and nothing's perfect, but it's better than it used to be.

Yeah, I think I like this new one.

okay fine i’ll listen. the new steve gunn still sounds boring to me. you’re getting to me ogmor

I can't get enough of this album. It's like, what if Michael Rother started hanging out with Bert Jansch and then he followed Bert to LA, started playing acoustic a little more often, and, around the time Bert makes Avocet, he makes Michael Rother Goes West.

William Tyler coming through with a nice spectral projection.

Man in a Hurry is gorgeous.

https://williamtyler.bandcamp.com/album/new-vanitas

i haven't even listened to it yet, just saw it on his bandcamp right now and holy shit, new william tyler!

after one listen, this is the surprise of the year so far for me. modern country and goes west were awesome, don't get me wrong, but they feel a little too overproduced in retrospect. this new one goes back to his older, more sparse approach. maybe that was out of necessity, as this year has constricted a lot of people in a lot of ways. references to heaven and "the big sky" in the song titles up the emotive ante significantly. all that combined with his more prominent use of pitch vibrato effects and the seemingly intentional 'throwback' aesthetic of the cover art make this seem like something beamed in from the past at some unknown, but vaguely familiar point.

besides all that, it's reaffirmation from one of my old favorites of his undeniably classic status; and doubly rewarding, as i had perhaps started to neglect him in more recent times.

here's the cover art, btw:
https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1109290106_10.jpg

also: an appropriate alternate title for this one could have been wt goes boc.

can't say enough good things about this record.

i was listening to this on my morning walk Friday and came to the realization that, in a quiet, sort of understated way (meaning sometimes i forget), WT has become one of my very favorite artists going.

this has been on constant rotation since friday. easily his best work since lost colony and easily in my top three of the year so far.

i'm real excited for this.

I loved New Vanitas, what is "this"?

oh duh I just saw that's a link

awesome, nabbed a vinyl preorder

Love Tyler, love Marissa Anderson even more, they seem like they should be a good fit

Opening and closing tracks are great but the rest is kinda noodly and slight? Might need time for the cohesion to emerge.

just did my first listen and I would agree with that, it sounds like they are having fun in the studio and going wherever the muse takes them without a ton of focus on tightening things up. that said these are two of my favorite musicians who I never expected to see collaborate, so I really liked almost all of it and expect I will only come to like it more with future listens.

really enjoying this and don't mind the drifty, low stakes vibes at all

what's wtf about the cover? it's just them walking down the street

yeah just dudes being dudes

Chicago underground duo released a great record few weeks back with same album cover idea too
doesn't seem bad to me I dunno

Ech, it's fine I guess. Just two dudes walking down the street thinking baout things.

all I want is “william tyler thinking baout things” music tbf

dudes rock

quick thoughts:

.i get what ya'll're saying with regards to it feeling a little directionless and "jammy", if you will. in that sense, it reminds me very much of older wt material such as behold the spirit or the paper hats record, in that most of it is more akin to drone philosophy.

."musical mark twain" came to mind while listening: taking the most whimsical/mundane and treating it with pure reverence.

.i cried through most of it.

.definitely feels of a piece with time indefinite. an analogy: that's his mo'wax album, this one's on 4ad.

.all that to not to discount four tet's input. it still blows my mind that these dudes crossed paths. who would've guessed!?

aoty? nah, but wt is my 2025 mvp nom.

Really recommend this album by Toronto home producer SHiFFRA (of which I am but one of three paying fans on BC) for anybody into the Tyler/Hebden collab, although this is much less FX-ed out and moody/Ableton-y, and much more blissed-out and breakbeat-y/AudioMulch-ish (or at least harkening back to that era), and so maybe taking things back to a Rounds tip w/r/t KH (although SHiFFRA themself types that Lemon Jelly and 9 Lazy 9 are more actual/outright influences on them and this album): https://shiffra.bandcamp.com/album/tepidarium

First track and last track are my favs. Reminds me a bit of Mountains, for those who remember them.

This record goes by in a flash. Apparently 'Timber' is the only one where they're playing guitar together, the rest was Kieran directing WT in the studio/gathering parts and putting it all together later.