When introducing "Area Code 601," the last song of his band's set on live album
Secret Stratosphere,
William Tyler says "We're gonna end with kind of a
Hawkwind meets
Charlie Daniels Band number." As far-fetched and ridiculous as that pairing might seem at first, it's a surprisingly apt description of the song's energy and a good opening line for trying to describe
Tyler's psychedelic approach to traditionally informed instrumental guitar music. The Nashville native was on the road and in the studio as a session player in the years leading up to when he began releasing music under his own name, and reshaping American primitive fingerstyle guitar into something more atmospheric and sprawling.
Secret Stratosphere is a superb showing of
Tyler's style in a live setting, with seven selections from across his catalog stretching out into full-on jams with the able backing of his band
the Impossible Truth. In this configuration,
Tyler's delay-heavy lead guitar is joined by pedal steel from
Luke Schneider (who makes beautiful ambient country sounds of his own), bass from
Raconteurs member
Jack Lawrence, and steady rhythms from drummer
Brian Kotzur. This 2021 date in Huntsville, Alabama captures the feeling of a hot night in early summer as the band drifts through lazy jams like the 13-minute medley of
Tyler's
Modern Country track "Highway Anxiety" and a spaced-out take on
Kraftwerk's "Radioactivity." Elsewhere on the set list is the uptempo ramble "Whole New Dude," the slowly building "Gone Clear," and a reading of "I'm Gonna Live Forever (If It Kills Me)" that's more organic and direct than its studio counterpart. Throughout the set,
Tyler and his band marry their earthbound traditional styles with more intergalactic psychedelia, hitting jam band heights without ever straying too far from the red dirt of their home planet. ~ Fred Thomas
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