Written by: Dave Cantrell

One of the most – if not the most – rewarding aspects of this music writing gig is building relationships over the years with this or that musician or band who you were not just aware of prior to scribbling the first word of your first piece but something of a keen admirer, of their work, their ethos, or, for want of a better phrase, just the way they go about things. For this writer, among the dozens that would fit in that subset, few – strike that; none – have been not just as steadily prolific but as ever-adventurous in their pursuits as Shimmy-Disc founder/primary driver Kramer (see here, and here, and here, and…), a statement that could likely go unsaid among many of our knowledgeable, ever-curious readers but needs saying anyway as a just-in-case safeguard for those few (and lucky; we can hardly fathom what a buzz of discovery it would be for the heretofore unaware) that are just now being tipped Kramer-ward but be forewarned, it can be a dizzying ride. And where’s that ride taking us this today? Well, teamed up here with deeply talented guitarist cohorts David Grubbs (Gastro del Sol, Bastro, Squirrel Bait and beyond) and the insanely prolific Wendy Eisenberg whose CV, beyond the eight full-lengths since 2017, runs through a host of crazy talented collaborators (Eugene Chadbourne, Morton Feldman, Sharron Krause, Brad Linde to name but a smidgen) in to a remarkable guitar trio with the slyly self-effacing name Squanderers (without the ‘The’ and derived, as it happens, from Grubbs’ full-length poem The Voice in the Headphones), it’s taking us to a place where excellence doesn’t merely dwell but runs a sublime riot over and through and beyond your ever-primed receptors into a place that, we can guarantee, you’ve never quite been before.

Paired here, as has been Kramer’s habit for the last couple years or so, with another of his uniquely sublime pieces of ambient-cinema, this first preview from the three’s upcoming debut album If a Body Meet a Body (arriving via Shimmy-Disc November 22nd), if as indicative as it very likely is of the album as a whole, well, lucky us, this is going to be a fine fall after all, and that’s not even taking into account what are likely further video outings in the offing that will no doubt entrance our senses as much as the one we’re discussing today, a clip rich in a sort of bespoke, collagistic impressionism just as they all been which leads us to think that, if he’s not careful (and we say this only half-jokingly), the visual may soon begin to compete with his audio legacy.

Issuing forth with a seamless palimpsest quality that is often nearly unnoticeable as it shape-shifts from image to image (there’s an intuitive drive at play, it seems, a sense of transitions not so much designed as allowed to manifest out of the ether), leading the viewer to be more or less engulfed in a sepia-tinged yearning through which the track’s arrangement threads a path that’s as deft as it is allusive, which is to say the two elements manage to merge into an effortless sync like a couple of long-separated theoretical twins finally reunited (which isn’t to even mention the inclusion of numerous – and, to be honest, quite fascinating – excerpts out of literary history wherein the word ‘squanderer’ plays a central part. Brilliant bit of editing, that, to say nothing of how exhaustive that search had to have been. That, my fair reader, is an artist dedicated to his art, full stop). [photo: Mitch Rackin]

Overstated, you maybe say? Yes no. ‘Yes’ in that one is naturally moved toward metaphoric exaggeration when presented with efforts this, well, effortless and sublime, and, therefore, ‘no’ for the same reason. And anyway, watch/listen, that’s all that matters at the end of the day, at the end of the article, but be assured that what you see/hear won’t soon fade away. Dreams, or at least the most powerful ones, are meant to stay with us, accompany us on our rounds wherever they may take us. This one’s no different.