Mystic Chords of Memory – S/T 
UK label Big Potato has been quietly slipping out essential reissues over the past few years, digging heavily into the psych and folk coffers. While long elusive gems like Emmett Finley’s eponymous 1971 LP seem pretty on par for what reissue labels strive for, BP has been rifling crates much closer to my own past. Following on a welcomed reissue of All Night Radio’s sole LP in 2021, the house expands their mapping of the terrain around Beachwood Sparks’ outer regions. This time they land on one of the aughts’ most essential, and most beguiling psych-folk records, though that tag is far from an accurate representation of the record. Coming out of the Sparks’ bow (for the time being) on Make The Cowboy Robots Cry, Chris Gunst connected with Aislers Set’s Jen Cohen to form Mystic Chords of Memory. The record is psychedelic, rooted in folk, with touches of lightly lapping country, but its nebulous nature refuses to let it anchor to any true genre.
The record digs deeper into the haze that shrouded Trees and Cowboy Robots, stripping away the widescreen sound for something more intimate — a Super 8 snapshot of the rolling plains. Its grainy textures obscure some shades, but among the hiss and humidity, the record is all the more charming for its rumpled exterior. It’s a dog eared book of a record, embracing the aesthetics of private press folk, if the locked away loners were also dosed on sunshine psych squeezed through a Viewmaster veneer. The band would go on to expand their palette post the eponymous LP, adding Nobody’s propulsion to the mix. Yet, in 2004, this was a record perfectly positioned for daydreams, in love with itself and with the aura that reverberates in every direction. Big Potato has given the album a lovely 20th anniversary treatment, remastered and in vinyl for the first time.