ALBUM REVIEW: On ‘Desert Pavement,’ ISMAY’s Songs Teem With Life

On Desert Pavement, ISMAY crafts a world that exists somewhere in between past and present, reality and fantasy, country and city. The title was inspired by the bluegrass lifer’s interest in cowboy poetry. Desert pavement is a natural phenomenon described in the book Home Ground: A Guide to the American Landscape as a stony, wind-streaked ground that is so densely packed no seeds can grow within it. On this, their sophomore album, ISMAY presents strange, spacious soundscapes — but barren they are not. Desert Pavement is richly inventive, using the in-between to help us make our reality more permanent.

ISMAY digs deep into the past for some of their muses: “The Shearer & The Darby Ram” opens Desert Pavement with a fresh take on a traditional English folk song, told from the perspective of the child who must shear the gigantic ram. “Stranger in the Barn,” similarly, has a dreamy, fairy tale-like quality about a family who takes in a drifter. ISMAY once again tells this story from a child’s perspective, painting vivid pictures with simple language and unlocking the magic that makes a song feel ancient and timeless.

Yet ISMAY uses those same approaches to address the concerns of modern life: not shepherds and farms so much as the false familiarity engendered by algorithmically enhanced social media (“Streaming Family”) and learning that a loved one’s real-life persona might be hiding a truly horrific side that only manifests online (“Essay Man.”) Juxtaposing these songs makes our modern concerns seem just as strange and alien to the listener as shearing a ram might.

ISMAY (photo by Aubrey Trinnaman)

For ISMAY, who spent their 20s on a ranch, immersion in nature is not an affect. The most striking songs on the album fuse their identity with those of animals. “The Lonely Stallion” may narrate the tale of a stallion who just can’t find his herd, but there’s a sorrow to ISMAY’s performance that suggests how much they identify with him. “Coyote in the Road” and “The Dove, The Shrew, and The Raccoon” similarly express feelings that might be easier left unsaid in human form. ISMAY further depersonalizes themself on “Melodies,” a song that imagines how their essential self is transmuted into wax, imagining this song encapsulated on a vinyl record placed on a loved one’s dresser.

The spacious production, plotted by producer Andrew Marlin (Watchhouse), creates a fantasyland where all of these perspectives feel easily plausible. By affording us these sidelong glances of our world, ISMAY follows in the tradition of born storytellers like Anna Tivel who give voices to those we don’t normally listen to. With Desert Pavement, ISMAY points to a folk music that can last hundreds more years, a tradition that is essential because it helps us understand us.

ISMAY’s Desert Pavement is out Jan. 26.