Great Lake Swimmers' Lost Channels

12/03/08 4:05pm

by Kate Harper (CHARTattack)

Tony Dekker's Great Lake Swimmers will release their fourth full-length album, Lost Channels, on March 31.

The follow-up to 2007's Ongiara was created after historian and photographer Ian Coristine invited the band to explore the Thousand Islands, an archipelago along the Canada-U.S. border in the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario. Lost Channels was recorded on the St. Lawrence River near Hammond, N.Y., Brockville, Ont. and Rockport, Ont. The disc is named after an area in the Thousand Islands where there were many disappearances during a battle in 1760.

The album is described as a cross between Graham Parsons-era Byrds, R.E.M. and The Faces. Dekker recorded Lost Channels with touring members Erik Arnesen (banjo, guitar), Greg Millson (drums), Darcy Yates (bass) and Julie Fader (flute, backing vocals). It features guest appearances from Blue Rodeo's Bob Egan, Serena Ryder, Erin Aurich (formerly of A Northern Chorus) and the Hylozoists' Paul Aucoin.

Great Lake Swimmers will tour North America in the spring. No dates have been announced, but here's where you can see them before then:

Jan. 9 Brooklyn, NY @ The Bell House
Jan. 10 New York, NY @ Mercury Lounge
Feb. 7 Guelph, ON @ Sleeman Centre (Hillside Inside 2009)

Here are the tracks on Lost Channels:

"Palmistry"
"Everything Is Moving So Fast"
"Pulling On A Line"
"Concrete Heart"
"She Comes To Me In Dreams"
"The Chorus In The Underground"
"Singer Castle Bells"
"Stealing Tomorrow"
"Still"
"New Light"
"Rivera's Edge"
"Unison Falling Into Harmony"