Joel Porter sits in his studio in Nashville, an heirloom of sorts, where you can still hear the echoing sounds of a decade’s worth of music from the journeyman artists who helped usher him toward his own version of a modern bard’s life. As an artist, composer, producer, and songwriter, Porter’s work embodies the endless landscapes of a youth spent in the plains of North Dakota, shifting borders of a genre often reduced to “alternative folk.” His latest release, A Costly Collection (2023), marks a continued journey with long-time collaborator Eric Hillman of Foreign Fields, following the path laid by the Mountain Twin EP (2017) and the Hiraeth EP (2018).

Porter’s songs delve into the complexities of family, solitude, and the quiet tension of being both connected and isolated. On St. Anthony (from Mountain Twin), we eavesdrop on his apprehension to “writing songs that make my father cry.” In Amaranthine (from Hiraeth), we witness his plea to “tempt a friendly death, among my reminisced,” a poetic meditation on loss and connection. By the time we reach “on your nape, I trace your spots and markers” in Little Tooth (from A Costly Collection), the listener is swept into Porter’s intimate world, where love, vulnerability, and change coalesce.

Porter and Hillman form a sonic guyline— a creative thread that runs through a genre often muddled by fleeting trends and hollow experimentation. Their music acts as an invitation to a lush world that is equal parts storytelling and confession and a prompt to explore and understand the universal joys and struggles of the human journey a little better.

Other contributors to A Costly Collection include Zach Hanson (Bon Iver, The Staves, S. Carey), Taylor Dupree, Joe Visciano (SYML, Beck), Ed Wood, Chris Gehringer (Sterling Sound), Isaac Flynn (Hembree), Nate Babbs, Brian Holl (Boy Bjorn, Foreign Fields), Lydia Luce (Lockland Strings), and IMOGEN.