Jurken, E.r.

***I Stand Corrected is the debut of a new talent and the debut of a new label, Country Thyme . Yes—a label was formed to release this artist, which means something special is in the air. Upon dropping the needle, you’ll hear exactly what it is, too: an honest-to-god song cycle, riches-to-rags style, rising and falling on the songs of E.R. Jurken and his spectral tenor, refracted via multiple overdubs across an oft-deserted soundscape, like haunted incandescent orchestral pop music with the orchestra mostly erased. I Stand Corrected took some time to stand up. During the 20-teens, E.R. Jurken—known to friends and fams as Ed—drifted through his thirty-somethings, doing not all that well. There didn’t seem to be a place for him in the world. A youthful passion for listening to and playing music and a proclivity for playing and singing hadn’t gone anywhere. He found himself far from home, in the Bay Area, withdrawing from society. This directionless time came to a head in 2012 with a deeply traumatic series of events that subsequently hung over him like a mist—eventually leading Ed to sell all his belongings (including his beloved instruments) and begin a series of moves: first, to New Orleans, then to his old Milwaukee hometown and finally, to his former and current home, Chicago. These moves were made with no particular idea in mind, other than the hope that they might somehow heal him. The past remained—but as Ed got a job and a bit of stability, he reviewed what had been and what might be. Ed bought a guitar off a stranger and with wounds just beneath the surface of his skin for so long, Ed began demoing songs on his mobile phone, turning out one a week featuring guitar and extensive vocal arrangements. After a few months, it was clear the cycle was complete. The sound of I Stand Corrected is often just acoustic guitar, offset by a lush tableau of vocal arrangements. Ed’s voice works the register, sliding easily into falsetto and adapting equitably to lower octaves as well, while populating the landscape with choruses of vocal color. These voices cover a wide swath of 20th-century popular music sensibilities, tipping the hat to everything from Paul McCartney, Beach Boys and The Mamas and the Papas to the Boswell Sisters and the Brothers Gibb.