by Niccolo Dante Porcello (@chromechompsky)
It Takes Time Records, a young newcomer to New York’s label scene, is reissuing Generifus’ 2011 record I Don’t Have To Worry. Initially self released by songwriter Spencer Sult, the re-issue puts back into print a seminal Northwestern folk-pop record that has existed only electronically for some time now. The new cassette features the 11 original tracks in addition to 13 unreleased demos, live recordings, and rare-compilation cuts from Sult’s archives. The collection finds the point between sprawling and intimate, pairing a large range of work with Generifus’ work itself – introspective, deeply personal, and reflective of the scene it was coming out of at the time of recording. Of the reissue Sult says “we hope these new materials, in addition to the tape, shed light on an interesting and productive period of music-making,” and indeed light is shed.
Between the original album and the 13 additional tracks, the spirit of Sult, and Generifus as a whole is snapshotted wonderfully in the collection. The songs, here heard after having aged 5 years, hold up incredibly well and hearken back to a generally warmer era of DIY, where distorted self-reflections were not the modus of the masses. 2011 seems somehow a more innocent year, especially when looking back on the music that came out that year, and Generifus’ work is a wonderful reminder of what seems almost like an era ago.
The album is out April 1st via It Takes Time Records, and the cassette is available for pre-order here.