Perhaps without you even knowing it, Joshua Abrams’ fingerprints are all over your record collection. Hailing from Philadelphia where his creative journey began with the earliest iteration of experimental hip-hop titans, The Roots, in the early ’90s Abrams moved to Chicago where his creative tentacles have since reached far and wide.
From leader of minimalist odyssey, Natural Information Society, to minimal quartet Town & Country and free-jazz trio Sticks & Stones (alongside Mantana Roberts and Chad Taylor) before that, the multi-instrumentalist has also featured alongside Drag City alumni, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Edith Frost and David Grubbs, post-rock giants, Godspeed You! Black Emperor (2003’s Yanqui U.X.O), Brokeback (1999’s Field Recordings from the Cook County Water Table), and so many more.
It’s been a career so vast that Abrams has even out-run Wikipedia. A creative expansiveness that has seen him cover just about every blade of grass across experimental music landscape. And following Natural Information Society’s excellent 2025 release alongside Bitchin Bajas, Totality, Abrams’ quest continues on his latest solo release, Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation.
Consisting of a viola-led composition clocking in at just over 35 minutes, Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation sees Abrams stripping it back to barely a prairie hum. It’s close listening. Ear-against-the-speaker close. Every grain of sound, put under the microscope, requiring your undivided attention. In many ways, Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation is beyond music. It’s more like a practice. Fourth world minimalism that lends itself to outer forces.
People often talk about the relationship between artist and fan. But with much of Abrams’ body of work, it’s more of a communication between musician and listener. There’s nothing wrong with that separation or distinction, either. It’s close in feeling, but also distant in nature, because it requires space to breathe. Joshua Abrams’ compositions, not just needing that space, but demanding it.
Following his recent tour in support of Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation, the Chicago-based artist answered some of our questions about his influences, processes, his creative journey, and more.
Joshua Abrams (photo: Mikel Patrick Avery)Sun 13: Who were your earliest heroes and influences, and do you still consider them influential in your work today?
Joshua Abrams: Early on, I had the good fortune to take bass lessons with Gerald Veasley and Tyrone Brown. Their knowledge and encouragement left a strong impression on me. At the end of high school, I became friends with Ahmir Thompson (Questlove) who opened my ears to troves of transformative music. The following summer, he, Tariq Trotter and I would busk on the streets of Philadelphia forming the first version of the band, The Roots. That experience calcified my resolve to follow music as a path and gave me a glimpse of what could be possible.
“I tend to aggregate and balance influences. Being obsessed with the music of John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk while I was a teenager never diminished with time or the arrival of other inspirations. I encountered Morton Feldman’s music a few years later and that remains very important to me as well.”
S13: Do you remember the first time you played the double bass and the guimbri?
JA: “I first played double bass in grade school. The first time I played the guimbri was in Essaouira in 1998. I had visited Malem Najib Soudani and he let me try one of his instruments.”
S13: Was your approach to Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation any different to your work through Natural Information Society or any other of your projects from over the years?
JA: “Yes. Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation is through composed and was originally intended to play constantly within the exhibition of the same name for five months. The two viola parts which make up the core of the piece are performed as written. The music I compose for Natural Information Society is written and then develops and grows over time, as we continue to play it in concert. The music I compose for NIS is designed to absorb and inspire embellishment and expansion. Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation also incorporates electronics and the 808 in a ways that I haven’t yet explored in NIS.”
Joshua Abrams - Music for Pulse Meridian FoliationS13: Do you set out to achieve a certain objective with each release or is it always the same?
JA: “I try to learn. I try to capture something in the recording that I want to hear and can’t hear elsewhere.”
S13: How important is silence to you and your artistic practices?
JA: “Essential.”
S13: Do you need concrete ideas to start making an album, or does it just organically happen?
JA: “There is a feeling I recognise when I am ready to make an album. An urge to clarify or realise a sound I can imagine on the periphery. A concrete idea might spark intuitive activity and intuitive decisions can lead to ideas articulated in language. Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation was created as a sound environment for Lisa Alvarado’s exhibition Pulse Meridian Foliation at RedCat in Los Angeles. Aspects of the exhibitions title and mural inspired the woven quality of the writing for the two violas in the piece.”
S13: Some artists say when they enter the creative process, certain aspects of it are out of their hands. Would you agree?
JA: “Yes. Sometimes the creative process is like being a radio antenna, receiving a transmission from within or elsewhere (shout out to Jack Spicer). Other times it is a process of moulding sound. The editing is a whole other part of the process with its own possibilities and timing.”
Joshua Abrams (photo: Mikel Patrick Avery)S13: From the outside at least, minimalism feels like it requires great patience. Do you consider yourself a patient person?
JA: “On occasion.”
S13: You’ve released so much music over the years. Are you someone who reflects on your past works, or are you always working towards the next thing?
JA: “I tend to focus on the future. That said, lately I have been making deliberate efforts to revisit past work to try to glean some perspective.”
S13: How much do you think Chicago has influenced your work?
JA: “Chicago is where I became a working musician and it has been the epicentre for my practice. Chicago has a vast tradition of experimentation that is unlike anywhere else.”
Music for Pulse Meridian Foliation is out now via Drag City. Purchase from Bandcamp.
