It's hard to believe that during their decades-long careers, Bill Callahan and Bonnie "Prince" Billy's Will Oldham didn't collaborate until 2022's Blind Date Party. Both Oldham and Callahan excel at combining folk, country, and rock in timeless and fresh ways, and their longtime label Drag City is known for how its artists cross-pollinate each other's work. Blind Date Party's origins stretch back to a tour Callahan and Oldham had planned with another labelmate, Silver Jews and Purple Mountains frontman David Berman, before his untimely passing in 2019. Recorded remotely during the COVID-19 global pandemic, this project continues that feeling of friends uniting to celebrate music and each other as Oldham and Callahan cover songs from all over with the help of other Drag City artists. Time has shaped their voices fascinatingly, adding comforting heft to Callahan's baritone and resilience to Oldham's warbly tenor. The former lends some warmth to the wry elegance of Steely Dan's "Deacon Blues," while the latter adds a mystical melody to Leonard Cohen's "The Night of Santiago," a spoken-word piece from his final album, Thanks for the Dance. When they join their voices, they complement each other perfectly, whether on their hymnal version of Cat Stevens' "Blackness of the Night" with Azita or the blissful harmonies on their version of Air Supply's "Lost in Love."Callahan and Oldham's collaborators are just as distinctive. The turbulent violin and guitar on this rendition of Robert Wyatt's "Sea Song" are the unmistakable work of Mick Turner, and George Xylouris gives Lou Reed's "Rooftop Garden" a fittingly lush acoustic makeover. Blind Date Party's mix of contributors and song selections remains refreshingly unpredictable from start to finish, even when the results sound similar to Oldham's and Callahan's own work (with the help of Alasdair Roberts, Dave Rich's "I've Made Up My Mind" could pass for a Palace song, and the gorgeous pedal steel on Jerry Jeff Walker's "Night Rider's Lament" evokes Smog's Red Apple Falls). The album is especially delightful when everyone involved really shakes things up: The High Llamas' Sean O'Hagan helps Bill and Billy transform Billie Eilish's "Wish You Were Gay" into bubbly space-age pop, Ty Segall's blobby synths turn Johnnie Frierson's "Miracles" into appealingly off-kilter soul, and Cooper Crain reggae-fies Iggy Pop's "I Want to Go to the Beach." Callahan's and Oldham's radical reworkings of each other's songs are also among Blind Date's highlights. With the help of Six Organs of Admittance, Callahan reimagines "Arise Therefore" into something resembling his own "Justice Aversion," and Dead Rider and Oldham revamp "Our Anniversary" into a towering psych-rock epic. This sprawling collection is packed with songs, and a lot of love as well. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the moving rendition of Silver Jews' "The Wild Kindness," which features Berman's widow, Cassie, among its choir of voices. Moments like this make Blind Date Party a satisfying tribute to Drag City's legacy of friends old and new playing music together. ~ Heather Phares
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