Ezra Carey

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On this Wednesday evening's Weekends With The Wizard, the Twenty-First Programme: the hyphen finally deserved and attained. But, more than that, some exclusivities and some neoclassicities. Of these matters, more herein:



Firstly, the album debut of Mr Ezra Carey, late of the Doug Fir and of Portland in general, who has unleashed upon this town a staggering blend of traditional gospel, folk and old-fashioned heavy rock-and-roll that I was privileged to be introduced to on accident this Friday as his band and he geared up for their CD release show. The album is entitled The Fire Keeps Us Warm and to my immediate and incredibly limited knowledge this will be the first time it or any of Mr Carey's material in general will have been broadcast on the PRA. It is very much worth hearing, and I believe—to judge from the preliminary material aired at the show—his next album will be even moreso. Marc-David Jacobs, Portland Radio Authority.



.For those that haven't heard Portland's Ezra Carey, he has one of those voices that when you hear for the first time, it sounds like a throwback to a different era. It's a voice & an overall sound that easily could have fit in several decades ago but yet sounds fresh in today's folk music world. Steve, Burn The Bowery



That's not to say that "Riverbed" is a relic. Even as it mines a distant decade, it feels completely vital today. Along with peers like William Elliott Whitmore and Oakley Hall, Ezra Carey makes a strong case that folk music still has plenty of kick left in it. And I'm not talking about avant-folk or folk-punk or anti-folk, but the traditional, least fashionable strand based around sensitive voices and quiet strumming. It's the kind of music that doesn't fit into our noisy, adrenalized culture anymore, which is exactly why it's such a necessary detour.



Of course, there's also the plain fact that "Riverbed" is a magical song. In large part, that's due to the vocal pairing of Ezra Carey and Mallory Posedel. The two complement each other terrifically, his earthbound twang giving texture to her dreamy echoes. It recalls Bonnie "Prince" Billy and Dawn McCarthy on The Letting Go, but somehow feels even prettier here. There are also the smartly spare lyrics, suggesting either great escape or deep despair. "The river is rising, rising/ Above my chin, above my chin/ and I open my mouth and let it in," the duo spellbindingly sings. "Yes, the river is rising, rising/ Above my head, above my head/ And she lays me down. upon her bed." In Ezra Carey's hands, that sounds like such a profoundly graceful option, a welcome refuge from the world these days. Charlie, Nerd Litter