Willard Grant Conspiracy

3am Sunday @ Fortune Otto's (Dahlia, 1996) is the tentative debut, a stark, introspective monolith, humbly recorded at home, that already displays their oddly plaintive tone (Morning Is In The End Of The Day, Siren On The Rocks).

Flying Low (Slow River, 1998) is better recorded but still somewhat unfocused and uncertain, despite a couple of confessional gems (Evening Mass, Bring The Monster Inside)

New Atlantis is the pearl of the mini-album Weevils In The Captain's Biscuit (Return To Sender, 1998), that otherwise collects tracks already released. The mini-album Radio Free WGC (Slow River, 1999), too, does not add much to the repertory (five kitchen improvisations?).

Mojave (Slow River, 1999) is, instead, an accomplished effort that overflows with solemn and depressed ballads. Another Lonely Night borrows the pensive tone of Leonard Cohen, but Fisher's vibrant and warm voice dominates the acoustic guitar's martial figure. Love Has No Meaning is a hypnotic, slow-motion, self-pitying dirge in the vein of Chris Isaak. Catnap In The Boom Boom Room is, instead, a suspenseful tale in the tradition of Nick Cave. The nostalgic I Miss You Best crosses Neil Young's Harvest with Bob Dylan's Knocking On Heaven's Door for a sad reflection on life. The prominent country twang, the sprightly folk-rock jangle and the gospel organ of Color Of The Sun moor a Van Morrison-ian delivery to a homey atmosphere. The crowning achievement of this album and of their entire career is the swirling, middle-eastern inflected, angst-ridden The Visitor.
The ensemble sound can be thick and galvanizing, as in The Work Song, whose cinematic, documentary quality is enhanced by an intricate counterpoint of string instruments, and can attain the majestic vigor of the Walkabouts in hymn-like compositions such as How To Get To Heaven and Right On Time. The group is capable of both a touching simplicity (Archy's Lullaby) rousing garage rave-ups (Go Jimmy Go) and psychedelic swoons (Sticky). Sixteen musicians participate in the recording, including second vocalist Edith Frost, two guitarists, a mandolin player, a viola player, members of Come, Silos and Sugar.

The Green, Green Grass Of Slovenia (Glitterhouse, 2000) is another mini-anthology.

Everything's Fine (Slow River, 2000) is slightly predictable, but, at least, rescues the band from the devastatingly melancholy of the previous album. The range of moods is perhaps broader, reaching the existential depths of Closing Time, a "slo-core" number worthy of Codeine's repertory, as well as the rocking Beautiful Song, propelled by Twanging/reverbed guitar and loud drumming. Occupying an ideal center are the calm, quasi-classical meditations of the majestic, waltzing Notes From The Waiting Room (with cello, piano and harmonica) and Drunkard's Prayer (with strings and harpsichord). A little bit to the left of the spectrum, the duo can sound as impulsive as the young Warren Zevon and deliver the powerful punch of Christmas In Nevada (gospel organ, cajun accordion, blues harmonica) and the singalong hymn Ballad Of John Parker. While certainly not revolutionary, these songs are occasionally breathtaking in their quiet intensity.
There is an increased reliance on the piano, particularly in the piano-driven lullaby Kite Flying and the closing elegy of Massachusetts. The voice is more emphatic, leveraging the instrumental drama and relinquishing some of the subtletly in favor of a more direct approach.
Musically, Robert Fisher and Paul Austin have become masterful arrangers, and can take advantage of friends such as Six Finger Satellite's James Apt, Codeine's Chris Brokaw, the Walkabouts' Terri Moeller and Carla Torgerson and Edith Frost.

The sessions of In The Fishtank (Konkurrent, 2001) that had for protagonists Willard Grant Conspiracy and Telefunk are devoted to six traditionals.

Robert Fisher surrounded himself with a crowd of respectable musicians on Regard the End (Kimchee, 2004), and the selection is consistently pleasant, but hardly revolutionary. Easiest to digest is the country-pop of Soft Hand, and most cushy is the gently arranged Ghost of the Girl in the Well, but the core of Fisher's vision lies in the heartfelt laments of Beyond the Shore, Trials of Harrison Hayes , Rosalee.

There But For The Grace Of God (Glitterhouse, 2005) is a career retrospective.

Let It Roll (2006) is generally more varied and gloomier (the eight-minute Let It Roll).

Fisher moved in the desert of California in 2006.

Pilgrim Road (Loose, 2008) is mostly a collection of spectral, philosophical, piano-based, gospel-ish Nick Cave-esque litanies (best Miracle on 8th Street), but it also includes the half-spoken Painter Blue, which sounds like a neoclassical version of Leonard Cohen and the country duet The Great Deceiver with Natalie Merchant.

They re-recorded songs from the previous albums on Paper Covers Stone (Loose, 2009).

Ghost Republic (Loose, 2013), performed by the duo of Robert Fisher and viola player David Michael Curry, was the outcome of a collaboration with a poet and a film-maker who also delivered a book and a film, all of them centered around the ghost town of Bodie in California. It is Fisher's most minimalistic album.

Meanwhile, Curry in Boston was also leading an ambient project called Empty House Cooperative that occasionally included cellist Jonah Sacks, Chris Brokaw of Codeine and Thalia Zedek of Come. Their only official albums were Painted Plane (2004), Seven (2016) and Hudson River Trilogy 1 (2017).

Fisher died in 2017 of cancer at the age of 59.

Untethered (Loose, 2018) was assembled by Curry after his death and contains seven songs originally on the EP Dwelltime (2013). The albums opens with the Captain Beefheart-ian blues of Hideous Beast and closes with the six-minute instrumental Trail’s End, dominated by the distorted guitar of Codeine’s Chris Brokaw.