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NOTE: Head to the Worried Songs Bandcamp page at https://worriedsongs.bandcamp.com/album/attic-room to order a 12" LP and a limited edition preorder zine of P.S. Opirhory's photography.
A thundercloud unfolding
after the rain,
and I’ve been falling forward
through the forest
without a flame
Won’t you take my hand
and float with me
through the canopy,
deep into the night sky
welcoming
A thundercloud unfurling
after the rain
and I’ve been falling forward
through the forest
without a flame
So patience, friend
and wade with me
down this shallow stream
Deeper pools will soon appear
with some traveling
I will not fade away
I’ll hold you in my arms
and wait.
I will not fade away
My colors will hold fast
not gray.
I walked along with you
and I found peace of mind
when I went
to trace my steps back
I found the path had grown wild
What is love,
if not a magnet?
What is love,
if not a study in time?
I walked along with you
and I found peace of mind
when I went
to get on my way
I found the path had grown wild
What is love,
if not an attic?
What is love,
if not a study in time?
Every little thing
soon will fall away
Photographs will fade
Ink will flood and bleed
In the autumn, I
watch the hillsides rise
fifteen shades of fleeting leaves
Falling faster still
down this great ravine
Thornbush on all sides,
I fight my body free
Till my skin gives in
to the briar’s blade,
rivers forming
canyon shapes
Late evening on
an island on a bay
It’s where I’d longed to be,
and where I’ll remain
until arbors give their offering
Took a walk down to the dock
and I was all alone
with the sea
and the docklight,
burning bright
I was covered
in speckles of yellow and white
with whom I
reflected off the water that night
There are rays of light
hesitating in your breath
tonight
when inevitably,
you fall asleep
lying next to me.
I’ll have
one last
cigarette
then lie down to rest
right next to you
My breath tonight
it’s physical
It billows in your cool
There are razor knives
dancing, playing
in your air tonight
when inevitably,
you fall asleep
lying next to me.
I’ll have
one last
cigarette
then lie down to rest
right next to you
My breath tonight
material
It billows in your cool
The past is
an attic room
where I pass the time
with you
a north facing space
warmed by morning sun
And I see you in the evening
out where east meets west
down by that blunt knife river
that snakes through the prairie grass
The past is
an attic room
where I pass the time
with you
a silhouette in space
formed by morning sun
And I see you in the meadow
and on those wide, heavy stones
down by that grape vine arbor
that sleeps through
winter sand
I will show you the sunrise
in the meadow at dawn
the garden
in the morning light
I will show you the sun
I will hold you through shadow
those blue and black tones
the floor of
the forest
where no ferns can grow
Somewhere near the ocean
in the river’s waters warm
That’s where you’ll find me swimming
with my lover in my arms
It’s high tide in Tucson
and I’m bathing in the sun
in those western waters gleaming
with my lover in my arms
The aperture is open
but the shadow still floods the frame
We’re all captive of a moment
and fist nor flight extinguishes flame
It’s high tide in Tucson
and I’m bathing in the sun
in those western waters gleaming
with my lover in my arms
Patchwork patterns
needle and thread
I have discovered
there’s more to this
winter weather
frozen mist
seagull singing
forgotten hymns
Patchwork patterns
needle and thread
I have discovered
there’s more to miss
straight line symbols
shifting stitches
like street lamps diffracted
floating hymns
about
Attic Room is Bob Keal’s fifth full-length album as Small Sur and first since his daughter’s birth in 2014. In this collection of songs, Keal meditates on the rhythms of domestic life and fatherhood while discovering newfound depths and maturity in his songwriting. Attic Room emerged from hundreds of song fragments that Keal scratched into the margins of life since the release of 2013’s Labor. The result is a “bedroom country” record, one that is inescapably intimate while also evoking the wide-open Midwestern landscapes of Keal’s childhood.
In March 2020, the Baltimore-based Keal found that the roles he valued most in life – that of a father, partner, and middle school English teacher – were suddenly heightened and complicated by the COVID-19 pandemic. A self-described “sensitive, open person,” he found that he needed to pivot quickly to being a rock for those who needed him, sometimes to the detriment of his own emotions. “I had to be really, really strong, and that's not something that I've ever felt compelled to be until the last few years,” he says. Keal also had to remain stoic about the abrupt cancellation of his album recording at a cabin in North Carolina, a would-be “open and shut five-day session” with his long-time bandmates and friend and musician Matthew O’Connell (Chorusing) working as engineer.
O’Connell and his brother, Joseph O’Connell of Elephant Micah, had been dedicated cheerleaders for Small Sur during a decade that saw Keal throwing the majority of his artistic energy into work, home life, and other creative pursuits. “They were super encouraging,” Keal says of their support. “Just staying on me to keep making music.” It was Matthew who pushed Keal to begin sorting through the trove of voice memos and half-written songs he’d recorded over the past decade. With O’Connell’s guidance, Keal sculpted ten songs to completion and made plans for recording. Sharing creative leadership felt vulnerable and invigorating. It was something he’d worked for while recording previous albums but never quite actualized, mostly because of time and budget constraints. In a way, circumstances dictated Small Sur move from what was comfortable, into what Keal liked most about making music. “Spontaneity and collaborative adventure,” he says, of what he had been hoping for.
After the first months of orienting to the COVID-19 pandemic, O’Connell proposed that Keal record the set of songs, albeit in a patchwork fashion. For much of 2020 and 2021, the two collaborated to record and solicit contributions remotely. The bulk of Keal’s delicate vocals and classical guitar work was recorded in the basement choir room of a chapel on his school’s campus, with O’Connell engineering and accompanying on grand piano and Telecaster. As a player, engineer, and co-producer, O’Connell helped to craft a cohesive avant-folk album aesthetic, creating tape dubs of instrumental tracks and running saxophone takes through a half-broken Echoplex tape delay, all the while creating sounds that Keal would not have encountered otherwise.
Small Sur’s music has always been spare, intimate, and deeply felt. But with the stripping of the conventional full-band structure, Keal was able to invite in even more community, while still creating a minimalist and personal sound. Attic Room includes Small Sur’s Andy Abelow (saxophone) and Will Ryerson (bass), as well as guests like North Carolina fiddler Joseph DeCosimo, pedal steel guitarist Dave Hadley, and singer Cara Beth Satalino of Outer Spaces. Keal trusted Wye Oak and Joyero’s Andy Stack, a long-time collaborator, to process his numerous instrumental contributions however he liked. The recording choices helped “make decisions'' for how the arrangements proceeded. As Stack describes it, “There is a palpable restraint to this music that creates its own kind of gravitational pull … you must make damn well sure that the notes chosen convey the right tones, because in Small Sur, each one weighs a ton.” The album was mixed by Erik Hall (In Tall Buildings), known for his production work with Bill MacKay & Ryley Walker, Lean Year, Wild Belle, and Elephant Micah.
Attic Room pays direct homage to the more languorous corners of Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark. On “Rays of Light,” dawdling percussion threatens to fall just behind the picked guitar melody and atmospheric saxophone. At moments, Hadley’s pedal steel sounds purely Nashvillian; at others, it evokes the otherworldly, textural playing of Daniel Lanois, whose collaborations with Brian Eno and Emmylou Harris provided a guidebook for how to bridge folk and the avant garde. Keal explains that as a listener and writer, he’s interested in structures where “there is a hook or pop sensibility or a melody, but then there's no chorus and the song just sort of floats away.” On single “A Clean Patch of Ground,” drums and guitar flutter in fits and starts beneath Keal’s textural baritone. “A thundercloud unfolding / After the rain / And I’ve been falling forward / Through the forest / Without a flame,” he sings, recalling the landscapes of his rural upbringing in South Dakota. The song’s title, and monastic lyrical style, is in reference to "A Clean Patch of Ground," a poem by Stonehouse (aka Shiwu), the 14th century hermit and Zen Buddhist.
Much of Small Sur’s music is earthy and visual, originating from the same foggy medium-fi tradition as Mt. Eerie and Grouper. Keal’s songs have long been personal tracts hosted in wild settings, where an encounter with nature looms large and helps the narrator sort through the messy reality of human life. As a review of Small Sur’s 2008 debut We Live in Houses Made of Wood put it, “These are nourishing songs, songs that are as close as we city-dwellers can get to the feeling of a strong harvest.” But in the process of becoming a parent and a teacher to small children, Keal’s narratives began to foreground the communal, more than the settings or even the self.
Just as Bill Callahan and Brandi Carlile’s recent works have held an unabashedly parental voice, Keal’s songs on Attic Room take the tender vantage point of a father. Watching his young daughter navigate the world, Keal is a nurturer, worrier, guide, and champion. On “For Juniper,” written for his daughter, Keal explains to the emotional young child that her big feelings will pass. “Every little thing / Soon will fall away / Photographs will fade / Ink will flood and bleed,” he sings. The song contains a bittersweet double meaning, as Keal watches his child and family grow older. Again, Keal turns to the window for understanding of change and an acceptance of the beauty in the present. “In the autumn, I / Watch the hillsides rise / Fifteen shades of fleeting leaves,” he concludes. In the songs and story of Attic Room, Small Sur finds strength and grace among transience.
credits
released October 7, 2022
Attic Room was recorded at home and in the basement of a chapel on a hill.
Engineered by Matthew O'Connell
Produced by Bob Keal & Matthew O'Connell
Mixed by Erik Hall
Mastered by Mat Leffler-Schulman
Additional Engineering by Bob Keal, Erik Hall, and almost everyone else who played or sang on this record
Bob Keal: Songs / Vocals / Nylon String Guitar / Piano (Patchwork) / Percussion (Rays, Aperture, Patchwork)
Matthew O'Connell: Tape Dubs and Treatments / Telecaster (Love, Juniper, Meadow, Aperture, Patchwork) / Drums (Love, Monhegan, Meadow, Patchwork) / Piano (Rest, Rays, Aperture) / Electric Bass (Rays)
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