Primitive Future II

Limited edition 12" LP on black wax, with screen printed outer jackets, insert and DL code. Side A: Guitar & field recordings by J. Moss. Synth by Remi Lew. Additional Music by The Modern Folk Trio Band. Side B: Music by The Modern Folk Trio Band: J. Moss, Austin Richards, Zach Barbery and Remi Lew Recorded & mixed by J. Moss Mastered for vinyl by Andrew Weathers Layout & Design by C. Foster-Baril Jackets screened by Thomas Dean at Lost Woods Print Thanks to Bre, Alma, Pepps and the family. "What is now proved was once only imagin'd" - William Blake, The Proverbs of Hell ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "When J. Moss looks toward the future, he can’t help but glimpse something that looks more like the past. A William Blake quote from "Proverbs of Hell” rests in the liner notes of Primitive Future II, his latest album under The Modern Folk banner: “What is now proved was once only imagin’d.” Here, Moss lets loose his cosmic imagination, conjuring from dazed daydreams Music from the Big Blink, pastoral guitar soli and drifting electric surf ragas for a coming epoch in which old growth forests reclaim human developments, a big shudder shuts online all the way off, and unnamed creatures return to roam in plain view. There has always been a streak of absurdist humor to Moss’ work as The Modern Folk, which has since 2008 served as a repository for his field recordings, Tascam sketches, far out noise, and improvised jams. But as fresh new apocalyptic conditions continue to mount, it’s hard not to wonder if he’s on to something: Is it future or is it past? At what point does it become impossible to say? Despite its sequel status—the album picks up where 2021’s Primitive Future/Lyran Group tape on Eiderdown Records left off—PFII provides a perfect jump on point for The Modern Folk’s discography. Like its predecessor, the album is halved: the A-side finds Moss evoking Takoma school acoustic reveries; the B-side features his Modern Folk Trio Band (Remi Lew, Austin Richards, and Zach Barbery) zonked out like the Ventures lost in space, peels of reverb drenched electric guitar drifting over tic-tac bass and hypno-rythmns. Drawing inspiration from John Fahey—whose folkloric tendencies and restless creativity encompassed everything from folk-blues to scarred earth noise—and favorite artists like Alex Chilton, Jerry Garcia, and Nina Simone, Moss prioritizes feel and raw expression over technical grace. Which isn’t to say that he isn’t a gifted guitarist, as evidenced by the lull of his gentle finger-picked odes to domesticity and fungi and the expansive interplay of the album’s second side. Originally released on the The Modern Folk’s densely populated Bandcamp page, PFII has been resequenced and edited for vinyl release on Charlottesville, Virginia’s WarHen Records. The album is housed in a screen-printed jacket featuring art by Modern Folk alumni C. Foster-Baril, who adorns the cover and liner notes with esoteric images: suns smiling, burning candles, coiled snakes, a boxy old computer. One inscription reads: What would you play on guitar if the power went out and you knew it was never going to come back on? Another wonders what you would play “if everything lit up and you knew it was never going to go dim?” When we conceive of other times, be they long gone or still to come, we are imagining. But not merely imagining. Moss understands this, and his riffy, dark comedy visions of what lies ahead (and behind) center on the multiple meanings implied by most all of the words we use to describe the world around us. What we call “modern” is an assemblage built from antique sources. What is called “primitive” could be just as easily understood as “elemental.” Largely operating outside of the music industry paradigm, Moss and The Modern Folk suggest another lane to be carved, one overgrown with huckleberry and crowded with mushrooms. In these songs there are spiritual lawns to be mowed, jokes to be retold until they land, hauntings and possessions by mysterious forces nonetheless at work in our desacralized age. To echo Blake once again: “The best wine is the oldest, the best water the newest.” The Modern Folk have returned with an overfilled Thirst Buster of each: drink up, good buddy. - Jason Woodbury, Phoenix, AZ, August 2021"