South

South 1998’s (née South) self-titled debut might just be the closest ye olde Jagjaguwar ever came to releasing music that would also sound at home on, say, ECM Records. Squint your ears and you’ll hear it — Pat Metheny-clean fancy-chord guitar puzzlings, each patiently layered into languid, hypnotic Steve Reich math cul-de-sacs; interlocking hammered dulcimer and vibraphones that fall and billow like the rare heavy snow day in a southern town; the hushed-n-confident vocalizations of Patrick Phelan and Nathan Lambdin, backed by the steady rhythms of drummer Tod Parkhill. Upon its initial release, we called the Richmond, VA project an “exegesis on the great ambient-rock moments of the 20th century.” We stand by that. But upon further investigation and with the hindsight of nearly 30 years since the LP’s release, its little tricky riches have only blossomed. It’s hard not to make some sort of comparison to a more contemporary crop of artists when revisiting South 1998, now renamed for SEO purposes (who knew back then!?!?). The experimental slowcore experimentalism of Copenhagen’s Escho records and ML Buch; a bit of cloudrock scene leaders (and Jag label mates) Chanel Beads; a great many of the releases on the esteemed (and underrated) Norwegian label Hubro. But it also deserves a place on the shelf next to its post-something, pre-something-else contemporaries of the day — Tortoise, Bark Psychosis, The Sea & Cake. South 1998’s hands-down Jagjaguwar classic was never lost per se, but we’ve found it again for you, on vinyl for the first time ever as part of our 30th anniversary celebration.