Papa M

***That chill in your spine makes total sense. PAPA M is back in the room, and like the animal you are, you sense it before you actually know he’s there. As the light from the broke moon floods in, you feel that you’ll survive—even if you’ll never be the same.... Late 2016’s Highway Songs brought Papa M back to us, after many years of silence and several harrowing dances with death for his Id-ego/host body, DAVID PAJO. Now, two years on down the road, we’re all here again to witness A Broke Moon Rises. Highway Songs was a necessarily cathartic experience in all phases. Afterwards, with no tour dates forthcoming (partially due to lousy clubs and their lack of wheelchair-accessible stage doors!), it felt good just to play for fun again, like being in the practice space instead of the psych ward—a much healthier change of pace than some might guess! David blew it out; all the different styles he’s played in over the years, from folk-blues to metal, electronic, pop, Bollywood—all of it. But when the spasms subsided, a back-to-roots sediment remained in the bottom of the bowl, which he read as a motive for a new Papa M album done with all acoustic instruments. That’s how there’s nothing electric about A Broke Moon Rises. The five songs of A Broke Moon Rises find David focusing his technique in unknown directions, to find out what he can do with them. When that happens, he finds himself on the very spot where Papa M music becomes alive! As the quietly funereal march of the opening track resonates with a spare drum beat, we are completely transfixed into the open spaces around the guitars.