Kevin Bronson on September 30th, 2011

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Jonathan Wilson titled his new album “Gentle Spirit,” but you suspect it’s only because “A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius” was already taken. Wilson, the North Carolina-bred singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer and keeper of the Laurel Canyon flame, has birthed a 78-minute opus that takes deep, long breaths, its lush orchestration and serpentine arrangements rewarding patient listeners and fans of guitar work that creates its own language. But noodling it’s not; Wilson packs plenty of meditative meat on “Gentle Spirit’s” lanky bones, if the hurried masses care enough to set aside their digital devices long enough to hear. The album (out on Bella Union) recalls simpler times, and it’s no wonder that as a virtuoso player Wilson has been called upon to tour with the likes of Jackson Browne and Robbie Robertson. And now Wilson has assembled a band to tour Europe as the opening act for Wilco. The video for “Natural Rhapsody,” directed by Michael Graham, sets the tone nicely.

||| Also: After the jump, stream the whole album: