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Julius Eastman and Will Oldham are kindred spirits. Self-styled provocateurs, they have positioned themselves on the outskirts of distinct traditions, pulling all manners of musical influence towards their outré stance. Eastman, who passed away in 1990 and whose work is experiencing a necessary revival, harnessed the vocabulary of minimalism for joyfully insurgent ends; Oldham's songwriting regularly conjures a pantheon that Greil Marcus called Inchthe old, weird America.Inch Last spring, these two visionaries collided at Cincinnati's MusicNOW Festival, and any distance between them was mediated by curator Bryce Dessner and ensemble Eighth Blackbird. On this album, woven between new arrangements of Oldham's cryptic songs and Eastman's iconic InchStay on ItInch are several of Dessner's InchMurder Ballades,Inch works that tease out the homicidal strain of old folk tunes. In InchDown in the Willow Garden,Inch a classic Appalachian tune, Oldham sings bleary-eyed atop harshly twanging timbres; InchUnderneath the FloorboardsInch takes inspiration from a recent murderous classic by Sufjan Stevens. These explorations of violence are natural fits for Oldham, who has always examined the interstices between intimacy and cruelty. Four of his songs appear here in new, sumptuous arrangements by pianist Lisa Kaplan. In Cincinnati, Oldham compared working with Eighth Blackbird to becoming acquainted with a Inchhaunted house,Inch continually returning to the same spot and observing how his fear was interlaced with a charged energy. The arrangements push Oldham's voice to new heights, as in the ecstatic refrain of InchNew PartnerInch or the lithe polyrhythms of InchBeast for Thee.Inch On InchOne with the BirdsInch and InchWhen Thy Song,Inch shimmering introductions deploy avant-garde effects as a window into Oldham's bleak, poignant sound world. Musicologist Matthew Mendez has identifi
