Hiss Golden Messenger: Poor Moon, Rich Harvest
This may speak to the boundary crossing of MC Taylor, an accomplished musician whose path led him out of San Francisco and into the folklore program at the University of North Carolina. Mr. Taylor, who collaborates in HGM with former Court & Spark bandmate Scott Hirsch, has settled in the rural Piedmont town of Pittsboro, North Carolina. Mr. Taylor wrote these songs at the kitchen table of his farmhouse, during spare hours while his son slept. These songs (some of which appear in stripped-down, field-recording form on his previous LP Bad Debt) speak to this context, but also exceed their creation myth in startling ways.
<p>&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href=”http://shop.heavenandearthmagic.com/album/poor-moon-2″&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Poor Moon by Hiss Golden Messenger&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;</p>
Well it’s alright now, the pain is gone.
It’s alright now, little one.
Riven from my body, as a ghost I dwell,
But my home, O I know I loved well
They drew a hex around my body, a hex around my soul,
called me from a place where I did dwell,
driven by my mind, down roads I didn’t know
they were roads that I would never see again.
In the context of The Art of the Rural, and our interest in the rural-urban exchange, Hiss Golden Messenger’s reading of Yeats offers a context and look forward to how else rural folk tradition could be honored and made new within contemporary music. In correspondence with Mr. Taylor, he confirmed that Yeats was an influence on these songs (along with Wendell Berry and the Bible); the Irish poet’s own use of folklore and Biblical reference was a mixture of Victorian antiquarianism and a kind of cultural nationalism where the visions of Irish peasants signified how rural space was un-English, inscrutable, and the anchor of Irishness. In short, it was a pastoral, not that far from the pastorals that still flourish in the American arts today.
Emma Brown: Have you always been interested in folklore?
MC Taylor: I guess I was, if you want to consider just being a really obsessive music fan and listener and collector and reader a folklorist, which it sort of is. But when I went to graduate school, my definition of folklore both narrowed and deepened. We didn’t talk about things like myths, not a single time, that’s not what it’s about. It’s more about expressive and/or vernacular culture and how it’s deployed in the public realm. To get a little academic about it! [laughs] I’m not looking for people that are old and possibly the only ones playing a certain type of music, I’m not looking for the last remnants of an old ancient story. If people are interested in a certain kind of cultural expression, whether it be low-riding, or hip-hop, or bluegrass music, that’s what I’m interested in documenting. Obviously it’s important to that group of people, so the question is how to they interact with that art form, what do they do with it, that sort of thing.
There’s a gorgeous confluence of art forms in Poor Moon – poetry, music, and folklore – but not what folks might expect. There are indeed field recordings here, but no instruments, no human voices are heard. In interludes between the songs on the second side we hear cicadas, birds, and a rainstorm, as the rhythm of one subtly shifts into the rhythm of another. As these songs conclude with questions of religion and redemption, these field recordings not only place the singer back in the North Carolina Piedmont but they suggest how the largest, most cosmic cycles are rooted in our local hills. That knowledge is part gift, part revelation, part responsibility. As the LP or CD spins in its cycle, alongside that lush album art, we’re reminded of the process inherent in what we create, what we cultivate. And we keep listening.