Originally recording under the moniker JBM, Jesse Marchant has crafted a name for himself as one of the most evocative and striking songwriters working at the intersection of folk and indie rock. Back in 2012 we noted his “haunting vocals and engaging lyrics,” and his style has only grow in the intervening years, developing both the emotional resonance and the storytelling clout. This summer sees the release of Antelope Running on AntiFragile Music, a brand new record that continues this development, and also confronts the passing of time since his early work.
The first roots of the album were sunken in the past. Marchant returned to various memories while working on the songs at a friend’s bungalow in Hollywood, near where he’d lived when recording his debut. But the present worked against the nostalgia, not only in the changes visible around California, but also the situation upon his return to Brooklyn—a summer of protest, fear and disease. A period of isolation in the forest followed, and with it the green shoots of the future, most notably with the news he was to become a father for the first time.
The album’s lead single ‘Go Lightly’ captures something of this mood, a track of fluid motion that ebbs and flows with an easy naturalism. “I am proud of how it moves through it’s different sections seamlessly, like a stream that flows and forms into pools before continuing on to do so again and again,” Marchant explains. “Incidentally, I wrote the song in a rented Catskill home that overlooked a stream, so who knows if that somehow subconsciously played a part.”
Channeling this imagery, Jesse Marchant evokes wider themes, uniting the past and the future through the present’s clouded lens. And while the track’s rich warmth draws the listener in, the lyrics are far more ambiguous. Heartfelt, yearning, but shrouded in a dark dread.
Who are we
On a mountain
Still in repair
Old lover, the sea
I’m adrift
In your night fogHidden parts
Go lightly
I feel so bad
In my blood
Antelope Running is out later this summer on AntiFragile Music and you can find it on the Jesse Marchant website.
