Earlier in the month we introduced General Absurdity & the Open Source, the mysterious new project or alter ego of Lexington, Kentucky songwriter Derek Feldman (who you might know as Doc Feldman). A self-described “CommUNITY Psych-Folk Music Rebel, Performance ARTeest, Pre/Post Historic Bluez, Multi-dimensional BEeing,” General Absurdity lives up to its name, offering an evocative and idiosyncratic sound that combines a psych-inflected brand of Americana with spoken word elements to create a Southern Gothic vibe for the twenty-first century. First single ‘Limestone Ghost’ highlighted not only the mystical bent of the project but also the core message of compassion. What we described as “folk music which belongs alongside contemporaries like Will Johnson and strives for human connection within this lonely world.”
Now General Absurdity & the Open Source has returned with two new singles, and the tracks really hint at the invention and intention behind the project. First is ‘Seeing Clear Through Goggles’, a song indicative of Feldman’s rich and carefully crafted folk style which displays how the esoteric and emotionally resonant can sit side by side. Slow-burning and brooding and loaded with strange imagery, the track is charged with a kind of personal urgency. As though faced with the dire present, an impetus to seize the moment emerges like an epiphany. “The mirror it filters out shame and distraction,” as Feldman sings. “You can think and talk all you want but neither compare with our actions.”
But if you thought ‘Seeing Clear Through Goggles’ pushed Feldman’s style in new directions, then ‘Attention! Blues’ sees it flying out to the edges of what folk music can be. A vast spoken word epic that mixes sardonic humour and cosmic psych to offer a blunt condemnation of the US’s imperialism and less than subtle embrace of fascism. The result is perhaps the longest calling card ever offered. An introduction to General Absurdity & the Open Source that demands a little effort and attention, thus combining style and substance into a cohesive whole. If this moment we find ourselves in, this moment of AI, MAGA and unbridled consumerism, is flat and banal and stupidly evil, then the antidote must be the opposite. Something thoughtful and finely crafted. Something which requires a little work.
‘Seeing Clear Through Goggles’ and ‘Attention! Blues’ and are out now and available via the General Absurdity & the Open Source Bandcamp page.