Hear Folk Guitar Savant James Elkington’s Dizzying New Track ‘Wading The Vapors’

After years of working as a master guitarist, and stints in two bands — The Zincs and Horses Ha — James Elkington is finally releasing his own solo debut. Wintres Woma (Old English for “the sound of winter”) will be out at the end of June, and today he’s followed up the first quick-paced single, “Make It Up” with a much slower, meditative track called “Wading The Vapors.

Elkington was born in England, though he now lives in Chicago, and he explained that the phrase comes from a phenomena he experienced in his childhood back in England:

The village I come from is mostly hills and pubs. As teenagers, my friends and I would climb the hills and cycle through these pubs in the span of a couple of weeks. One place lay at the other end of a half-wild, unlit area of woods called “the common,” an area populated nightly by juvenile glue-sniffers and middle-aged dog-walkers. The drunken walks back from this pub as the fog rolled in over the common were weird and unsettling in the best way, and I tried to pull all of that into “Wading The Vapors.”

Wintres Woman features a host of collaborators, which makes sense given Elkington’s longtime role as an accompanying and collaborative guitarist, and this track prominently features a dizzying cello solo and vocals from composer Tomeka Reid. Listen above and look for more coming from Elkington in the lead up to his debut release.

Wintres Woma is out 6/30 via Paradise Of Bachelors. Pre-order it here.

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