‘Major Arcana’ by Major Arcana
Forty-eight years after its initial DIY release, the self-titled album by Milwaukee’s Major Arcana has finally been issued properly. The mixed-up mastering of the original LP has been fixed, allowing voices and instruments to shine, and even the colorization of the unforgettable front cover by comix artist Dennis Kitchen has been corrected.
Major Arcana was among the many projects of Milwaukee’s brilliant cultural figure of the ‘70s, singer, songwriter (poet, magus) Jim Spencer. Since his death in 1983, some of his work has attracted international attention. His forays into dance music have been anthologized and covered in Europe; some of his folk material has been released digitally by Chicago’s Numero Group; but it took a Catalonian label, Guerssen, to finally tackle one of Spencer’s most sought-after albums. Original pressings of Major Arcana have been selling for big bucks on eBay and inferior bootlegs have circulated. Guerssen has issued the definitive edition.
Major Arcana bears virtually no resemblance to the music of 1976, the year it was recorded. It arrived too late for the ‘60s and too early for the ‘80s psychedelic revival. That said, it must be added that decade-driven catchalls and genre labels don’t serve to describe the album. The LP opens with “Western Wind,” a magical invocation of folk music from the ancient British Isles. Like lost moments from the early days of Fairport Convention, “Western Wind” is a love song served sweet but without sugar. “A Dark Trip to Edge City” is spoken-sung against a rhythmic backdrop of congas and bongos and an almost evanescent folk-rock electric guitar line that brings to mind The Byrds at their most venturesome. “Steal Your Love Back Home” sounds like a jam session overhead in a dream. William Blake can be discerned, and the blues can be heard, along the journey to the closing track, a reinvention of “Greensleeves” positioned at the edge of jazz—but that description is only a suggestion.
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Much of the attention to detail on the reissue was driven by Milwaukee guitarist Barry Patton, a member of one of Major Arcana’s early lineups and a guest guitarist-singer on the album. “I wanted it done right,” he says, adding, Spencer “was a singer-songwriter who first and foremost gave himself a wide berth of genres. He liked all kinds of music, psychedelia and folk to rock and R&B, and he was successful at all of them.” And Kitchen’s front cover? Imagine Hieronymus Bosch in a playful mood.
