9.3.19 by Ryan Masteller

Hey, Lero, I didn’t ASK you to do my work for me. Don’t you know that it’s the job of us writers, us journalists, to assign easily digestible categories that can summarize your whole output in a word or two? See, for me, “Folkdrone” is the exact kind of thing I would’ve come up with to describe your music if you hadn’t already stepped all over my toes about it. I’m not sure I feel comfortable anymore about any of this.

I’m only half joking! My ego may be bruised, but that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy this rich folkdrone music. Because that’s what it is – psychedelic acoustic guitar recordings run through various programs and processors, coming off like fireside versions of whatever the computer and synthesizer nerds are cooking up in their various basement nerd laboratories (looking at you, Wether). Lero plays like a shaman, conjuring spirits and allowing the friction of the instrument and player and recording devices as much space as the instrument itself. The result is a mystical trip through time and space, through the body, through the mind. Are you on LSD? Wait … am I?

(No.)

So, taking my job quite seriously as I do, I must recommend you fine people to rustle up a copy of Lero’s “Folkdrone” from the good folks over at Lighten Up Sounds. Each ten-minute side is an absolute journey to the outer limits of your imagination, a raga-like meditation on the human spirit. Or maybe just a meditation on all the cool sounds you can make with an acoustic guitar and tape loops and mics and stuff. Edition of 50.