by Dan Goldin (@paintingwithdan)
Seven years after Jessica Risker began releasing albums under her own name (previously recording as Deadbeat), the Chicago singer/songwriter returns with the stunning Calendar Year. Due out on August 1st via Island House Recordings (Pat Keen, Elkhorn, Tim Barnes), the record, written in 2020, captures “a year in the life,” a psychedelic folk album that reflects on the dour times with beauty amid the difficulty. Risker and her band expand the atmospheric qualities of 2018’s I See You Among The Stars, dropping further into cosmic acoustics and Broadcast influenced textural warmth. There’s gentle strength in each of the songs, soft and intricate, but assured and resolute.
“He’s Gone,” the record’s fourth single marks a shift in the record, the blissful nature of the album given more bite. Unapologetically noisy (at least by comparison), the song swirls beyond the tender introduction, gaining a sense of anger and disappointment in regards to bad male behavior. For all the intensity however, it’s still a beautiful song because Jessica Risker, even in anger, writes beautiful songs, the progression twinkling like a terse lullaby. Macie Stewart (Finom) makes a special guest appearance on strings, providing a sweeping weight to Risker and the band’s floating aura.
Speaking about the song, Risker shared:
“‘He's Gone' is an angry song, inspired by a cultish and Trumpish world. The song watches someone as they work through the loss and betrayal of a dominating relationship, in which their thoughts and feelings were warped for someone else's gain. It speaks to a shared female experience of male violation, and the anger that comes from that. The song moves from a quiet build to an angry intensity to a fog of swirling chaos and noise. In addition to the core band's contributions, Macie Stewart composed strings for this song, which added a beautiful dimension of tension and dissonance."