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The opening notes to “Quiessence,” the first song on Barry Walker Jr.’s new album, Paleo Sol, set a meditative intention. Walker’s spacey pedal steel floats like clouds above a dawning day, surveilling a wide-open landscape, the aural possibilities seeming endless and malleable as cymbal swells and sleepy acoustic guitar coo a score for a kind of living dream. It’s the sort of album opener that invests in the listening experience as primary driver, rather than the ignorable soundtrack to an endless cycle of multitasking.
“I try to compose for a person to be able to close their eyes and make their own film in their head,” he explains.
Walker—whose prowess on pedal steel has made him a go-to collaborator and bandmate for Portland groups like Rose City Band and Mouth Painter—often leans on the vernacular and visuals of his career as a geologist and teacher, where he’s logged serious time in the field studying volcanism, for his music. It’s during times of isolation and solitude that the seeds of his songs come in the form of nebulous soundscapes that owe themselves to the environments he’s rooted in. As heard on “Quiessence,” there is space for things to shift, to grow, as he explains occurs in the rock record in a geologic sense.
“The action actually is happening at quite a spectacular pace,” Walker says. “But because human lives are so short, we’re not really seeing much. I tend to have periods in my music where there’s not much going on, and then something that happens, that catches, and I want to catch my own attention or catch the attention of somebody listening.”
Similarly, “Sentient Lithosphere” carves its own contemplative score. At over 12 minutes long, the track takes on the audio qualities of a prolonged watery submersion, with Walker incorporating the lowest tones available on his pedal steel above a distant, three-note bedrock.
“It is kind of what [it could sound like] if you speed up the noises that the lithosphere makes by several thousand times,” Walker says. “The low, subsonic emissions of the earth.”
That attention to the interaction between listener and composer permeates the eight tracks on Paleo Sol. To better accomplish that emphasis, Walker summoned the accompaniment of two of his most trusted musical colleagues—Jason Willmon, on bass, and Rob Smith, on drums—to help bolster the sonic rivulets found on the album. That trio will be joined by Rose City Band guitarist-vocalist Ripley Johnson during the album release show for Paleo Sol on Jan. 29 at Show Bar in Southeast Portland.
The album has endured an unusually long gestation period, having been completed in late 2021. Walker even recorded and released a different album during that time: 2025’s live effort, At the 13th Moon Gravity Well, under the name Barry Walker Unit, which included both Willmon and Smith, in addition to Rose City Band drummer John Jeffrey. The pensive space permitted by Walker’s spacious melodies offers a premium canvas for the musical flourishes of his Rolodex of collaborators. It’s why the cover of Paleo Sol includes Willmon’s and Smith’s names, too; their contributions to the album’s wide-ranging instrumental explorations should not be undersold. In opposition to Walker’s 2018 solo record Diaspora Urkontinent, on which Walker is the only player, the songs on Paleo Sol called for Willmon and Smith to flesh things out.
“They’re feelers, so I didn’t really have to tell them much,” Walker explains. “I just like how they play. This record would be cool without them, but I don’t think that it would have the soul and depth and character that it does without their subtle contributions. I think they were crucial in this.”
Two other album release shows will flank the Show Bar engagement—one in Seattle and one in Corvallis—each of which will be recorded in hopes they could yield another live album. Walker says that due to the intense layering of the instrumentation, it’s hard to re-create the album versions, making it likely that through improvisation each performance will be unique listening experiences, an outcome that’s just fine as far as Walker is concerned.
“We live in this frustrating time of playlists and AI, and people want to hear live music,” Walker says. “There’s a hardcore group of people who want to hear live music played by humans. And I’m very appreciative of that. These are my people.”
SEE IT: Barry Walker Jr. with Marisa Anderson at Show Bar at Revolution Hall, 1300 SE Stark St., revolutionhall.com/show-bar. 7 pm Thursday, Jan. 29. $23.23. 21+.
