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On “Disappear 1,” which opens Rowboat’s Of Disappearing, Sam McNitt displays a keen gift for articulating the paradoxical delicacy and intensity of certain emotions. The crushing sense of loss conveyed in that song is both comforting and unnerving: It’s as though the feelings being addressed were too overwhelming to endure in the moment but returned as a ghost of despair years later. This theme runs through the rest of the album in both words and music. On “In the Pines,” the minor-key synth swells conjure a sense of walking through fog, psychological or actual, with no pat resolution in the end. The stirring lushness of “Cold, Black Wind” somehow harks back to both A Storm in Heaven-period Verve and Townes Van Zandt. In stitching together elements of rock, country and folk, Rowboat has created an introspective work of transcendent beauty.
