It's important to note that Autumn Bird Songs is not new material. Jason Molina made these recordings of just himself and an acoustic guitar several years ago, before he abruptly canceled a tour with Will Johnson, before he shuffled between hospitals and rehab centers, before his health problems led to dire financial problems (like many musicians, he had no insurance), and before he started working on a farm in West Virginia raising sheep and chickens. Anyone who approaches the material looking for insight into his condition may end up reading too much into the lyrics and possibly missing the point of this modest release.
This mini-album accompanies the book From Blacksheep Boys to Bill Collectors, which includes artwork by William Schaff and writing from Will Sheff, John Darnielle, and Darren Jackson (the songs are also available for separate digital download). Published by the Savannah-based Graveface Records, it's an intriguing mix of the musical and the visual, especially since Schaff and Molina both emphasize the handmade and the homespun in their individual media. Written for the project when it was devised several years ago, the songs have the feel of woodcuts, stitched samplers, shadow boxes, and rough pencil sketches. Much less elaborate than Schaff's creations, they're essentially demos, capturing ideas and moments with no regard for crisp fidelity. The click of the recorder is audible after most songs, and a roomy hiss pervades opener "Heart My Heart" and "A Sad Hard Change", creating an eerie sustain for his strums and evoking another presence there in the room with him. Perhaps it's the "my love" he addresses on "Shore to Shore". "The ocean, my love, was not enough," he sings. "The nightingale rose but her soul could not."
It's unclear whether this demo sound is the result Molina intended or simply one step toward fleshing them out with Magnolia Electric Co. or some sympathetic collaborator, but it does lend the collection a cohesive quality similar to 2006's Let Me Go Let Me Go Let Me Go. Molina sounds good in this setting, his voice well suited to the creaky intimacy. He sings like he's telling old secrets, with a sharp shiver in his notes, and the mood is that specific Molina flavor of somber that ties all of his records together. With only eight songs running 22 minutes, Autumn Bird Songs is a slight collection-- a 10" rather than an LP-- and yet there's something compelling about that slightness, which echoes Molina's preoccupation in ghosts and spirits.
He peppers these lyrics with familiar references to hauntings, plains, highways, and wings-- all emblems of big ideas about travel and rootlessness, turmoil and security. In other words, Autumn Bird Songs continues a detailed emotional cartography he began 16 years ago with Songs:Ohia. While it may work best as a complement to Schaff's artwork-- or, more fittingly, as an addendum to Magnolia Electric Co.'s 2007 box set, Sojourner-- this release underscores the enormity of Molina's absence these past few years, as well as the promise of his return.
