Eric Anders and Mark O’Bitz will be releasing their new folky concept album ‘American Bardo‘ on July 31st on Baggage Room Records, and today’s song is the upcoming single from that release. The album was inspired by the George Saunders’ Mann-Booker-Prize-winning novel, ‘Lincoln in the Bardo.’ All the songs on the album are readings of the characters in the novel.
The plaintive and haunting ‘A Home the I Can’t Know‘ is inspired by one of the novel’s main characters, The Reverend Everly Thomas. Unlike the other characters, the Reverend is aware that he is dead and also suspects that he and the others are heading toward an I-less existence beyond time and what they call the “matterlightblooming effect.” It is this knowledge that at some point he will lose his individuality that makes him choose to stay in the bardo as long as he does.
Northern Californian singer-songwriter, Eric Anders, and southern Californian guitarist-composer, Mark O’Bitz met at one of the latter’s shows in the early 2000’s. It’s been a flourishing songwriting and recording partnership since the pair decided to collaborate on music making – Eric Anders was spurred to release his first three solo albums in just four years and ‘American Bardo‘ is the duo’s third album. And there’s more to come in 2021 – they have decided to do a pseudo-concept album: ‘Sirens Go By: Music in the Time of Coronavirus’ to fill the time whilst they are stuck inside due to the ongoing pandemic. That album will see them working remotely with all the musicians and the producer, Mike Butler.
