Black Twig Pickers

Ironto Special

LP • $20.00 Add to Cart

Debut Thrill Jockey release from the Twigs, available on LP (w/download code). The album is also available here on CD, and a download-only version can be had here.

We think "Ironto Special" is the best representation of Black Twig Picker sound yet produced by any recording scheme -- Nathan's chiming banjo, Isak's muscular guitar runs, Mike's sawing fiddle: It's all here with an immediacy and depth previously heard only if the band was playing on your porch. Thirteen songs, including two originals ("Smoker Wedding March" and "Craig Street Hop") and a slew of traditional material with a deep history in the band's "Ararat to Talcott, and a ways farther out" home territory, all delivered, of course, in the Twigs' signature highly personal, ecstatic manner. Fiddlesticks, washboard, bones, even a snare drum -- all here. Yelps and shouts, yep. As he did on the Twigs' "Hobo Handshake" album, Charlie Parr sits in for the final track, adding a tolling baritone 12-string to the lament "Rockin' in a Weary Land."

All versions of the album come with detailed notes on tunings, sources, etc., plus Whitney Waller's drawings of the band. The package is wrapped in Jeanna Duerscherl's photography. Truly the best presentation of the band's recorded output to date.

Ironto Special Reviews

• ... if this one doesn't make you tap your feet ... you really should check to see if your soul is intact (Nine Bullets)
• ... the spirit of true traditional American music. (No Depression)
• ... an eeriness that at times has a slightly threatening otherwordly feel ... (American Roots UK)
• Music that stops you in your tracks is a revelation ... (Freq)
• ... hold on to earth, mountain earth that I will one day return to, I hope. (Freq)
• ... some of the best old-timey music around. (Magnet)
• ... traditionalism that's never creaky ... (Dusty Groove)
• ... alive, raw, and timeless ... (The Velvet Rut)