Artist Profile: Arthur Russell

By Tom Carlson

Arthur Russell moved from rural Iowa to New York City with not much but a cello and a dream in the early ’70s . Russell spent about 20 years in New York, nearly broke and in relative obscurity before passing away from the AIDS crisis in 1992. 

During his time in New York he worked under many names, in many genres and collectives, and with notable artists of the New York Avant Garde. He worked with composers such as Steve Reich and Phillip Glass, poet Allen Ginsberg and musicians Ernie Brooks (Modern Lovers) and David Byrne (Talking Heads). 

In his time, Russell was an artist’s artist and today Russell’s music has been brought back to the cultural consciousness. Sometime in the early 2000s, the music label Audika was formed solely as a means to posthumously release the thousands of tapes Russell had never released to the public; however, Audika still hasn’t published a large section of Russell’s work that can still easily be found. 

Now without knowing any better one would assume his music is recent. It is at times folky, at times spacey and at times disco, but it was always seemingly consistently ahead of its time.

Russell’s Disco Era 

Under the name Dinosaur L, Russell created a disco track titled “Go Bang” which features the trombone, the fretless bass, drum machines, live drums, organs, stretched vocal samples, keyboards, and the electric piano. The song is almost ambient but it’s also rooted in the rhythms of disco. 

It’s as simple as a man with a voice and a cello using doses of heavy reverbs and echoes to create a truly unique sound. (Arthur Russell | Calling Out of Context Album Cover)

Russell’s compositions are virtually non-linear. Other projects like “Loose Joints” created during the disco era start to show something that is consistent throughout all of Russell’s incredible discography and that’s that it tip-toes the line between pop and art-music. Russell’s compositions are less like songs and more like their own worlds. 

Russell’s Iowa Roots 

The recently released folk track “Come To Life” was recorded in 1976 and combines avant-garde sounds with americana. Similar sounds are found on the record “Love Is Overtaking Me” which opens with a sweet folk love song titled “Close My Eyes.” Halfway through the album Russell accompanies his voice only by his cello in the track “Eli” a song about his dog. The title track “Love Is Overtaking Me” combines some of the disco rhythms seen in Russell’s drum machine work with acoustic guitar, and lots of echoing vocal layers that make the track incredibly dreamy. At the end of the record we reach a stripped down love song written for his partner, a song simply titled “Tom” which uses a simple beat accompanied by the electric piano, and soft drooping vocals singing intimate lines such as “being sad is not a crime.” 

World of Echo and Beyond 

Much of Russell’s work is solo. It’s as simple as a man with a voice and a cello using doses of heavy reverbs and echoes to create a truly unique sound. It imagines the vision for the world in which Russell’s music exists in. Russell’s album “Corn” features heavy drum beats with what sounds like a radio static ambience behind it. 

Two of my favorite tracks from Russell’s discography appear on the album Another Thought: “This Is How We Walk On The Moon” and Russell’s most recognizable song “A Little Lost” a song produced with the sounds of the acoustic guitar, cello and Russell’s undeniable voice all mixed with the familiar echoing effects that make his music so unique. The song creates polyrhythmic lines with how the cello and voice wrap each other around the total of three guitar chords. 

Wild Combination

Russell’s album “Calling out of Context” features his magnum opus, “That’s Us/Wild Combination,” a song that totes the line between disco and rhythm with its soft synthesizers and Russell’s imaginative world of echo, cello, ambience, layered vocals, and as always sincere and personal lyrics. All of his compositions are worlds of their own, but this one, which had been worked on for years, really opens us into his world. 

It may be difficult to find all of Russell’s music, but there’s so much of it and new recordings are frequently released. So while I leave no direct link, I would be remiss to not encourage you to research and explore the creative and marvelous discography of the late great Arthur Russell.

Tom is a culture writer for La Tonique.