Bilders - Dustbin of Empathy

The great people at Grapefruit and Sophomore Lounge combine forces for this latest long-player from one of NZ's great raconteurs, Bill Direen. As Builders/Bilders for decades now, Direen has oscillated freely between collaboration and solo pursuits, seemingly at the whim of whoever happened to be around and willing to get it right. Dustbin of Empathy appears especially fortuitous in that sense, with Matt Swanson and Alex McManus of Lambchop fame joining for a show of beautifully recorded, subtly rendered outsider-Americana that plays to the strengths of all involved. Swanson and McManus perform with great poise and reverence, providing the the shading around Direen's trademark idiosyncrasies, driven as always by off-centre storytelling rich with odd detail and a kind of word-of-mouth folk melodicism. And to that point, Direen may have come up via Flying Nun's indie underground, but i've always felt the folk tradition more appropriate to his means of presentation, that sense of the naturalistic, the rural, the embedded, at times like an Antipodean Robyn Hitchcock ... Dustbin of Empathy double downs on that approach, with the sense of stories to be told, to be shared, to be passed on, and all achieved with a particularly thoughtful supporting cast who know just how to let the best bits shine. A stately, late period flourishing as autumnal as music this inspired comes. And note: very low quanities available, sorry.