Biography
Chicago natives Wil Hendricks and Michael Krassner helm the folk-pop endeavor known as The Lofty Pillars. As the Windy City’s go-to studio figure, Krassner assembled the Boxhead Ensemble, an all-star post-rock collective formed expressly to score the Dutch Harbor soundtrack. In contrast to that soundtrack’s open, achingly sparse instrumentation meant to convey longing, The Pillars favors conventional songwriting. Across the eleven tracks of When We Were Here, his subtle, piano-driven folk melancholy unfolds like a set of weather-beaten Bowie ballads. Even so, the album features exquisite pedal steel and orchestration whose breadth recalls the varied yet equally wide-eyed work of Nick Drake, the Dirty Three, and even Journey.