When he died in 1992 of Aids-related illnesses at the age of 40, Arthur Russell left behind one of the most staggeringly beautiful bodies of songwriting ever – and it is still emerging. This compilation of unreleased tracks from his archive mostly date from the mid-1970s, recalling the country-tinged songwriting collected on 2008’s Love Is Overtaking Me, with a scattering of the lopsided, slightly wacky funk and new wave he scaled up to in the 80s.
Russell nerds will be enthralled by curiosities such as Barefoot in New York, a piece of brass-backed stuttering spoken word, and the lusted-for 1985 deep cut You Did It Yourself, which points the way to both the jittery disco of Get Around to It and, further, the haunted aesthetic of World of Echo. Its workaday lyrics, complaining about the ending of a movie (“it just seemed tacked on”), are made strangely mythic by the vaporous new-wave backing.
But this isn’t only for completists – anyone will thrill to Russell, whose ability to anchor wandering thought with melodic resolution is as strong as Bob Dylan’s. His naivety is palpable here, and might be a bit much for some, with the title track and Just Regular People truly childlike. But that guileless stance, staring up at the world in confusion, hurt and wonder, is what sets Russell apart, none more so than on a pair of devastatingly unrequited love songs, Words of Love and In Love With You for the Last Time: two new classics on a set full of them.
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