MoonStone

LYON-TRAILS-12-MoonStone

“Among all words I knew there is one

With the power to record and to re-present

The secret, I see, is with humble intent

To use it simply. Moon.”

     -J.L. Borges (excerpted from “The Moon”)

Alex Doolittle - Drums
Audrey Herren - Cello
Andrew Morgan - Ocarina / Piano / Guitar / Electric Bass / Triangle / Feedback
Anne Schneller - Violin
Chris Shaw - Upright Bass
Erin Wood - Harp

Recorded summer 2012, Chicago, Illinois // fall 2016 and spring 2017, Lawrence, Kansas.
Mixed and Mastered by Matt LaPoint.
Original Release Date: 22 June 2017.

Image: unknown (from Thalman family archives; restored by David Marquardt).

Darkening

LYON-TRAILS-11-Darkening

Suddenly the city was empty, its residents in mass holiday exodus.  Green pharmacy crosses flashing all the more brightly for the lack of headlights on the boulevards below.  The fountain at Place du Maréchal Lyautey burbling all the more clearly for the lack of early evening drinkers on the patios of bars nearby.  And the sky over the chimneys of Croix-Rousse all the more otherworldly when seen alone in the south meadow of Parc de la Tête d’Or, the light fading and the summer darkening.

Kristina Dutton - Violin
Andrew Morgan - Guitar / Piano
Mike Giffin - Percussion

Recorded fall 2013, Lawrence, Kansas // El Cerrito, California // Astoria, New York.
Mixed and Mastered by Matt LaPoint.
Original Release Date: 4 January 2015 (Moorworks // Japan).

Image: "Flood of 1908" (from Thalman family archives).

First Light, Stoneback Drive

LYON-TRAILS-10-First Light, Stoneback Drive

Being able to drive again was a godsend.  I had originally planned on driving out to LA from the Midwest so I’d have my own car for the sessions, but it had met its end the preceding winter on a downtown bridge over the Chicago River.  The car had been my grandfather’s, and he had passed just a few months prior, so it felt like losing him all over again.  Before it was towed away, I pried a plastic insignia from the dashboard to have as a keepsake – of my grandfather’s car, the car I learned to sing in, the car I drove to New York in, the car I kept all of my possessions in for four months in Chicago before my best friend and I got our first real apartment. 

Michalis Koutsoupides - Violin / Viola

Recorded spring 2008, Lawrence, Kansas.
Mixed by Mike Giffin.
Mastered by Doug Van Sloun.
Remastered by Matt LaPoint.
Original Release Date: 31 July 2009 (Broken Horse // UK)

Image: The North Carolina (from Thalman family archives; restored by David Marquardt).