The last six months have been some of the most musically creative of David Clark Carroll’s career and saw him create a substantial body of instrumental work, moving far beyond the early folk singer sounds to utilize a borderline symphonic sonic palette. From the “sunshine in a bottle” of the Apple Cider Sessions, to the dystopian mandolin orchestra of The Aftermath, these two collections of songs are bookends for an incredibly surreal end of 2024 and the remarkably rough start of 2025.
As one review notes about The Aftermath “Even the sunnier bits feel ominous….. like massive storm clouds rolling towards you as you try desperately to finish a picnic under the last remaining shreds of a blue sky.” Begun as a studio experiment to rearrange some older melodies for electro harmonix mandola, it became a logical counterpart to the more cheerful Apple Cider Sessions, created over two weeks in late January of 2025 as it became clear it was taking on a life of it’s own.
These two works share the goal of creating a rich sonic landscape, somewhere between folk, bluegrass, Celtic, classical and avant garde jazz awash with discordant harmonies and clashing twin melody lines. A true solo conversation as every note on these two records was played by David on either mandolin, mandola or guitar through either a condenser microphone, or through an EHX pitchfork pedal and LR Baggs preamp to craft the eerie low cello like tones that fill out The Aftermath.
Daring Coyotes 