Since his last proper solo release in 2018, Ryley Walker has certainly maintained his sense of adventure, remaking a lost Dave Matthews Band album, releasing his second instrumental collaboration with drummer Charles Rumback, and getting deep into the weeds with Japanese psych combo Kikagaku Moyo. At some point during this busy stretch, he also found time to compose and record some of his most intricate and satisfying solo material to date, released here as Course in Fable, Walker's fifth album. An artful nexus of impressionistic songwriting, prog-rock vision, and melodic nuance, these seven tracks shimmer and roil in hi-fi glory, thanks in part to the efforts of veteran producer/engineer John McEntire (Tortoise, the Sea and Cake). The pairing of these two Chicago eccentrics from different generations is an inspired one and makes a certain amount of sense at this point in Walker's career. His emergence in 2014 as a much-heralded folk troubadour grew over subsequent years into a snaky path of idiosyncratic left turns, somehow leading back (albeit transformed) to the influence of his hometown. While Walker now resides in New York and McEntire in Portland, they meet (figuratively and sonically) in the middle with an impressive set that melds the former's inventive prog-pop with the latter's detailed hi-fi indie fusion, sounding like nothing from either coast.

1		Striking Down Your Big Premiere
2		Rang Dizzy
3		A Lenticular Slap
4		Axis Bent
5		Clad with Bunk
6		Pond Scum Ocean
7		Shiva with Dustpan