The Dead Tongues - Montana (Vinyl)

140-Gram Vinyl LP

Psychic Hotline's LP is the first vinyl issue of Montana, pressed on 140-gram vinyl under catalog number PSY913, with ten songs split five to a side. The Dead Tongues first released the album themselves on March 4, 2016, on CD-R, numbered cassette and download. The label's notes single out "Wildflower Perfume" as a fan favorite.

The Dead Tongues is the songwriting project of Ryan Gustafson. Psychic Hotline's notes describe Montana as the record on which he wove Appalachian old-time music and primitive three-finger guitar into his songwriting. Andrew Marlin, of Mandolin Orange and Watchhouse, produced, recorded and engineered it, with Bobby Britt on fiddle, James Wallace on drums and Jeff Crawford on bass; Nick Petersen mastered it. Gustafson's own credits run from vocals, guitar and banjo to harmonium, mellotron and harmonica, and the photography is by Josh Coyle.

Gustafson had moved to Asheville, North Carolina, from Durham by the time the album came out. "Graveyard Fields," the opening song, takes its name from the area of Pisgah National Forest near Black Balsam Knob. "Escaping for me usually means going out in the woods or getting to the beach," he told WUNC at the time of the release.

Psychic Hotline reissued Unsung Passage, which the label calls the band's third album, in 2023. Dust, the fifth Dead Tongues album, brought in Joe Westerlund and Andrew Marlin along with backing vocalists from Mountain Man, and Gustafson has toured in support of Ben Howard, Hiss Golden Messenger, Watchhouse, Sarah Jarosz and Mountain Man.

Tracklist

Side A

1. Graveyard Fields
2. Empire Builder
3. Black Flower Blooming
4. The Gold Is Deep
5. My Companion

Side B

6. Capitol Blues
7. Wildflower Perfume
8. Nostalgia
9. Stained Glass Eyes
10. Embers of Midnight