Chris Eckman
Where the Spirit Rests

If there's someone who wasn't, isn't, and never will be a prophet at home, it's Chris Eckman.

Yet, I would have bet, like many others, that Seattle first and then the United States would have given him what he deserved.

Also because a band like the Walkabouts — of which he was a proponent for over 2 decades together with Carla Torgerson — aside from some distinctions, sounds Americana of the best possible craftsmanship, like a Band with a rougher temper and a frowning air.

Not to mention the rather odd, yet committed involvement in the ranks of Sub Pop alongside Nirvana, Soundgarden, Mudhoney and the certainty that the Walkabouts too would get a crumb of the pie and that, in any case, they would have earned and deserved it.

Instead, nothing. The exodus to Europe, a new homeland, Slovenia, and a second home, Italy, a loyal following, niche but still a following. And that «Emona. Live in Ljubljana» — the first official live testimony gifted to the readers of “Mucchio Extra” — which by now, 20 years ago, revealed everything about the musical and not only ethics of the band.

To date, it's been 11 years since the Walkabouts have given news of themselves; I know little about Carla Torgerson; a bit more about Chris Eckman and his travels to the far outskirts of the musical metropolis, from Mali to Turkey, along with Chris Brokaw (Codeine, Come and much more) and Hugo Race (Birthday Party, Bad Seeds and much more of him too) or solo.

In «Where the Spirit Rests», Chris picks up the acoustic guitar again 8 years after the previous «Harney County» and with a little help from friends like Chris Cacavas (Green On Red), Alastair McNeill (Laibach), and Catherine Graindorge (Nick Cave, Warren Ellis) — just to mention those minimally visible — his voice delves deep to tell 7 minimal stories, brief tales suspended in an atmosphere as stern as Johnny Cash's American recordings and misty and nocturnal like so much of Tom Waits, composing an evocative and explanatory album from the cover itself, a journey winding from the unrest of «Early Snow» to the neurosis of «Cabin Fever» until the truce of «Where the Spirit Rests», yearned like water in the desert and just as illusory.

The weather isn't great; it's tough for those who implore love and for those who chase fleeting sex and even for the bold, to put it in Chris's words, and anyone hoping for better times is not a reliable prophet either or sees too far ahead.