Written by: Dave Cantrell

When I first heard The Blue Nile I marveled in a way I’d never marveled before. Shivers propounded that I didn’t recognize but welcomed as old friends, a warmth inherent as if I’d dreamed that sound previous to hearing it which made the actual hearing of it eerie in the most beautifully unsettling – and welcome – way. And now hence, several decades later, I happen upon a video, upon a song that acts as presentiment to that visual, and there I am whirling in place to the same spell, a spell apparently undying, one made of a bespoke newness, like living again inside a dream of a fleeting feeling you had all those decades ago. They aren’t nothing, these experiences, this is life insisting itself in song form, saying in something of a hushed whisper “You’re not done yet, pal, not even close. There’s always always more you need to listen to” and I hear that, here, in this track from Big Bend, the nom de tune (if you will) of Nathan Phillips from Mansfield OH.

While it’s a common plaint from, well, just about anyone hoping to always somehow hear everything their subconscious wants them to hear, it’s an especially vexing issue for this writer when something this compelling finally drifts with what seems great intent into my path from an artist that’s been plying their beguiling trade for damn near a decade, and while there’s a temptation to shake my fist skyward and curse the universe for keeping me from such obvious beauty, it is, of course, the better, more noble path to be humbly grateful (in this case to Kramer and the Shimmy-Disc label) to have encountered it at all and move forward. So…

First off, and perhaps obviously, it’s that exquisite, intuitively gentle power that The Blue Nile brought to their work that was responsible for the spell they cast never fading and is why the experiencing of them back in my late 20s returned with an unforced insistence upon hearing Big Bend’s work. It’s an impression that only deepens when investigating this project’s earlier work, not least 2019’s lush, inevitably moving Radish album, itself the result of a painstaking, explorative, illuminating and ultimately epiphany-laden process that reflected Phillips’ background and inspirations he was drawn to and could not help but follow, ie Arvo Part, the remarkable Lonnie Holley, and the more esoteric stretches of Van Morrison’s work among others. Combine that with his experiences with Laraaji and other like-minded artists (which isn’t to even mention, regarding that background I mentioned, being the grandson of Scott Huston, a beloved Cincinatti-based 12-tone composer on his mother’s side, the same mother that writes music and sang in operas and provides background vox on some of her son’s work) and it’s easy to understand where the depths of his talent likely stem from. Thing is, though, even with all that ‘understanding,’ Big Bend’s music nonetheless presents like a quantity derived from some mysterious, inscrutable source.

Accomplishing what at face value should be impossible, the track here, from the upcoming Last Circle in a Slowdown album, rides a wave of delicate tension that’s nonetheless strong enough to never quite break, withstanding its own subtle but unstoppable momentum to deliver a piece of music that stuns as it soothes (or is that the other way around and how exactly does that matter?), that intrigues in just about the most honest emotional way imaginable, restraint and compulsion gliding along together like the secret sides of the same equation they’ve apparently always been. Indeed, we feel it’s safe to say that not since the above-mentioned has the notion of being so utterly transfixed in a way that can only be described as quietly electrifying been presented with such soul, such deftness, such unforced accessibility. There’s a confidence to the naturalism here that makes what was without a doubt a very involved process feel as effortless as breathing and in that sense alone this is, yes, a marvel. But really, in the end? Imagine this: you’re standing in a late summer field, the tall grass all around you is dry, golden, the air crisp and warm.  The city’s not far away, you can still hear its constant murmur. Now, close your eyes, concentrate on the ambient sound flowing around you, the textures in the breeze, the rhythm of life that until a moment ago was as unnoticeable as it nearly always is for all of us in our daily fuss of living, and for the first time in a long while if not ever you understand the beauty that is always pulsing in the atmosphere. Like this track and for similar reasons, it’s a wake-up call, an invitation to notice the intensity, the beauty, that speaks so often and so eloquently in the quietude. “Wheeling,” in its sound, may present as a stroke of humility but in its impact, its intricacy, in the way it casts a spell so subtly transfixing you can’t – nor would you wish to – shake it, it is a resounding accomplishment. [pre-order Last Circle in a Slowdown here or here]