Gold Dust featuring J Mascis - "An Early Translation of a Later Work"

Photo by Brian Lasky

Gold Dust started out as a project for western Massachusetts based DIY punk artist Stephen Pierce to explore his fascination with traditional folk and psychedelia. Now Gold Dust is a four piece set to release their third album. The first single from that album, "An Early Translation of Later Work," could be one of the most western MA releases we've heard in a long time, and adding J Mascis on electric sitar only makes it more so. The song is a six minute epic psychedelic folk song that seems to reach crescendo after crescendo. The fact that it will appeal to hippies and indie rockers equally is one of the factors that makes it so strongly connected to the western Massachusetts sound. Plus, I bet you never knew how badly you wanted to hear Mascis shred an electric sitar, but now that you know it exists, you know it's going to be great. You only don't know how great.

Stephen Pierce says of his band's western Massachusetts sound:

“I look at this as a band starting to figure out who they are by leaning into regionalism. That's something that I miss, when different parts of the country and world would have distinct sounds and musical movements coming out of the communities, usually having something to do with their surroundings, be it geographical or cultural. Our rural part of the state is so culturally different from the more metropolitan part of MA; I've been pretty intentional pulling together from all the various music from around the world that influences me and tie it to something specifically evocative of rural New England.”

You can listen to "An Early Translation of a Later Work" below. In the Shade of the Living Light is due out May 16 and is available for pre-order through Bandcamp. For more on Gold Dust, check out the band's website.