Stream: Imaad Wasif, ‘So Long Mr. Fear’

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Imaad Wasif

Imaad Wasif admits to being a man “of many mythologies,” an artist with a resumé long enough to be well-known but whose often-mesmerizing body of work carries an air of mysticism, if not outright inscrutability, that makes him hard to, well, know.

Long-timers are familiar with Wasif from his membership in ’90s slo-core/noise rockers lowercase, the psych-folk outfit Alaska! and the later incarnation of Lou Barlow’s The Folk Implosion. Wasif is also a longtime touring member of Yeah Yeahs Yeahs. Other collaborations range from experimental music (Grim Tower, ACID) to shredding, heavy psych-rock (EFG). And he has released six solo albums, starting with a self-titled affair in 2006.

And yet he says: “To be intimate with an audience is perhaps the greatest conflict I’ve encountered in my work, on one hand wanting the connection but at the same time shying away from ever allowing myself to getting too close, for fear that some great mystery would be dispelled. In the end though, here we are again, alone together in this music.”

Here we are again, indeed. Wasif’s sixth album, “So Long Mr. Fear” (which came out Friday) finds the songwriter lifting the veil farther than he ever has. Foreshadowed as it was by 2018’s “Great Eastern Sun” — a collection of home recordings Wasif originally thought too dark and personal to release — “So Long” proves spellbinding in its simplicity and fragility.

The album was made with multi-instrumentalist and longtime collaborator Bobb Bruno (Best Coast), though he and Wasif were not in the same room. “We built a tunnel through the goddamned pandemic, and though we never saw each other during the making of this, we were connected in the ether, sending songs back and forth to arrive at their completion,” Wasif says. Bruno’s “magic touch” and flourishes such as Evan Haros’ sitar on two tracks and Lewis Pesacov’s mix bake “Mr. Fear” in great warmth. If, as Wasif says, the pandemic has been a time for “confronting demons and doubts,” those adversaries only bow their heads in defeat on this album.

“Fader” is possibly the most buoyant song Wasif has ever made, and it’s not just Jen Wood’s backing vocals (perfect as they are). On “I Am Free,” Wasif sounds so sanguine that even the most direct lyrics are imbued with emotional weight: “I’ve got the feeling in my blood / that I was born to win / I’ve got the warmth of your love / to make my world spin / I’ve got a heart of solid gold / that melts away the cold / And if the darkness sets in / I won’t let it take hold.”

Karen O backs Wasif on the hauntingly gorgeous “Poet of the Damned,” the gentlest of calls to stop the madness: “Disintegration is a crime / Let’s come together in our minds / before end times.” In the title track, he acknowledges the peril of the virus but does not bow down to it. And a pulsing organ with a featherbed of synth hold up Wasif’s tendril of a vocal on “Painted On.” The latter is reminiscent of Mercury Rev, and at other points on “So Long Mr. Fear,” the likes of Elliott Smith, Neil Young, Grandaddy and the Flaming Lips may come to mind. It’s a good orbit to be in.

In ways subtle and direct, Wasif, a self-described “spinner of webs,” entangles us in nothing less than his own reckoning. It’s liberating.

||| Stream: “So Long Mr. Fear”

||| Previously: “Unhinged,” “Carry the Scar,” “Far East,” “Priestess”