If you know your spiritual and/or aviary lore, you may know where the band Birdtalker picked up their name. It’s a saints-praising allusion… St. Francis of Assisi, specifically. “Part of the reason that we like him is that he’s a religious figure who really doesn’t like religion,” says co-founder Dani Green. “He liked to make a fool of himself as a way to remind people that no one is better or higher than anyone else, and he preached that creation was much more our family rather than something to be conquered.” And then, of course, there was the birdtalking: “There’s the anecdote about him on a walk with friends, going up to a flock of birds and starting to speak to them, and how they started to respond and come land on him.” St. Francis: the original sparrow whisperer. The effects of the group on fowl and game have not been field-tested, but what’s been proven already is their effect as human whisperers, not to mention soul stirrers.  With no label support, media buzz, or even imaging to speak of, their song “Heavy” has become a streaming phenomenon, racking up more that 20 million plays on Spotify at last count. It was a call to the heavy-laden to cut off ballast, if not do anything so drastic as take flight. The weightiness of the song’s weightlessness captivated listeners who discovered it through Spotify’s Discovery Weekly program, bringing the freshly intrigued out to see Birdtalker on their first tour recently, and whetting appetites for their full-length debut, One. For anyone who took to “Heavy” (reprised on the new album, after previously appearing on a freshman EP), there’s a lot more burden-lifting where that came from.

Everything becomes fluid when you can pass through time and space like a ghost, a story, a melody. Boy Golden manifests all three on For Jimmy. When listening to his music, it feels easy to dissolve into the ether. Everything flows. From classic country to psych-folk, Alternative to roadhouse pop to Appalaichan bluegrass, Boy Golden’s music is easy, breezy, warm and gritty. And don’t it just feel good to listen to it. Since releasing his debut album, Church of Better Daze, in 2021, he’s played every summer festival on your list, produced X albums with friends, released a dozen videos, curated and directed an art show and music video for “KD & Lunchmeat”, the Seth-Rogenesque hit single that charted to #1 on Alternative Radio, and toured with The Sheepdogs on XX date North American tour. Introspective and vulnerable, traditional and queer, hard-headed and sensual, Boy Golden’s everyman-aesthetic can appeal to all of us. This ability lies in his songwriting: the songs your friends tell you about, the stories you hear from your neighbours, your community. He’s comfortable both in the spotlight and just outside it, sharing the moments with other artists, lifting others up along with him. He’s a genuine student of Townes Van Zandt and Willie Nelson as much as Dwight Yoakam and Stevie Ray Vaughan . Plus his C.O.B.D philosophy, “You can blaze and still get paid” might help us all to blur borders and old definitions of genres we thought we knew, like Steve Lacy or Justin Vernon do for Pop music.   Boy Golden is able to maintain his own unique blend of Boy Golden using whatever frame of mind he’s in to fit us into this time. We’re here right now.