Magnolia Electric Co. “Josephine”
The first thing I noticed was the name: Secretly Canadian. In the annals of indie label history, this one ranked pretty high for me. Funny. Mysterious. Unassuming. Not as iconic as Sub Pop or Dischord, but more alluring than Merge and Matador. Less self-serious than Factory, but also not twee like Kill Rock Stars. Secretly Canadian struck the right chord. It sounded like a good inside joke. It was implicitly cryptic and it could have meant nothing at all. But somehow — and maybe it was based on their roster of artists — I quickly assumed quite a bit about them. For instance, I assumed that they were of Midwestern stock — not Canadian but also not so far off. Moreover, I assumed that they were both keenly aware of and one league below their esteemed, slightly northern, but still Midwestern neighbors — Touch and Go Records.
Secretly Canadian was born in the shadow of Touch and Go. Which is to say that they were working with artists That Touch and Go were either not interested in or not aware of. But that also, like their forebear, they stood for artistic integrity, professional fairness and a sober view of an extremely difficult business model. Over the years, I’d dealt with hundreds of small indie labels, nearly all of whom ran on unbridled passion and personal credit card debt. But within a few years most of those labels shuttered, adding themselves to the long tail of aspiring ventures driven by “why not — let’s fucking do this” fervor and a profound naïveté about the financial realities of their chosen field.
In truth, the majority of independent record labels are just barely businesses. Many are actually side hustles for aspiring musicians who also have other jobs. And during the Nineties, at the peak of major label hegemony, before vinyl’s resurgence and before iTunes and before streaming, the market was especially brutal for indies. The economics of a CD recession combined with insufficient demand for vinyl, a high cost of goods and constrained profit margins left very few good options for small label owners. As a failed former indie label owner myself, I can confirm — it was a slog back then. An occasionally thrilling slog, but a slog nonetheless.
Even the most legendary and enduring indie labels faced financial hardship during the NIneties. Sub Pop might not have survived without the good fortune of Nirvana and the great fortune of David Geffen. Matador was propped up by lucrative deals with Atlantic and then Capitol Records. And those were the success stories. In the days before music went digital — before Modest Mouse and Death Cab and Spoon and The National became bonafide Rock Stars — indies were eking their way towards dissolution, losing money on every compact disc sold and losing more money on every vinyl record pressed. But Touch and Go were almost different. They ran their business like a business. They were vertically integrated. They were a zine that became a label that became a label group that became a distributor. They paid and collected on time. And when the moment arrived wherein the label could no longer outrun the constraints of their unit economics, Touch and Go shut its doors.
Of the many things that Touch and Go bestowed upon Indiedom — beyond Bedhead, Blonde Redhead, The Jesus Lizard, Low, Shellac and Slint — their greatest contribution might have been the blueprint for love and work. Touch and Go ensured that business goals never exceeded creative vision while understanding that, without a solvent business, those creative visions had no platform. And so, their fifty/fifty hug and handshake deals evolved into fair and straightforward two page agreements. They were operationally sound. They knew what to spend on and what to save on. They recognized that most new releases lose money, while catalog and distribution deals keep the lights on. Touch and Go were driven and, in their own way, competitive, but they were also exceedingly kind and equitable. They were the bar — for Midwestern indies but also for all indie labels. They were the very best case for Secretly Canadian.
And yet, somehow, Secretly Canadian cleared their bar and exceeded their case. More than a quarter century after their founding in Bloomington, Indiana, Secretly Canadian operates an esteemed label group, record plant, distributorship, management company and music supervision service. They are the most vertically integrated music business on the planet and the new model of indie music business prosperity. They survived the fallow Nineties, and continuously optimized ever since. Their success, which coincided with the Indie-zation of mainstream Rock music and the proliferation of streaming services, was bolstered by the commercial achievements of artists like Bon Iver, Antony and the Johnsons, Angel Oslen and Sharon Van Etten. But it was ensured by solid business practices — by the assimilation of love and work.
If Secretly Canadian is the apotheosis of love and work, the loadstar for Secretly Canadian was Jason Molina. Born in Ohio and laid to rest in Indiana, Molina was — like his label — a Midwestern product working in the shadow of Touch & Go. Originally claimed by his musical antecedent, Will Oldham, Molina quickly found his home on Secretly Canadian. In 1997 they released his self titled debut (sometimes called “The Black Album”), and over the next twelve years, under various guises, Molina would come to embody his label’s bent for writerly singers who were post-post-punk and post-post-rock. During his twelve year run — a period which coincided with the launch and ascent of S.C. — Molina was wildly prolific, releasing seven LPs and at least six EPs as Songs: Ohia, four LPs and one EP under his own name, and five more LPs (one of which was a box set) and two EPs as Magnolia Electric Co. Molina wrote songs about Civil War battles, retired football greats, endless highways, ghosts, stars and shades of blue and black. His personal thirst for knowledge was as famous as his public aversion to facts. But the things about Molina that stood out most of all were his capacity to work, and his capacity to love.
During the fledgling early days of Secretly Canadian, Songs: Ohia was perhaps their best known artist. But also, that is not saying very much. Six albums in, Molina had established himself as a songwriter’s songwriter who made darkly beautiful records somewhere between Will Oldham’s Palace and Geoff Farina’s Karate. Songs: Ohia was a steady touring act and an even steadier album making act. Sales were sufficient by tiny indie label standards but paltry by most any other. However — and it must be said — Jason Molina was never “cool.” To his fans, surely that was part of his appeal. He was the opposite of The Strokes and Interpol. Intellectually gifted and musically blessed, Molina was also short and balding. He could never pass for an engineering student with a mysterious side, like the guys from June of 44. He could never pull off Will Oldham’s “I know what I look like and I don’t give a fuck” thing. He was endlessly hard working and deeply loving. During his living years, however, Molina did not sell many records, and never so much as sniffed the zeitgeist.
But in 2003, through a combination of genius and practice, practice, practice, everything almost changed. “The Magnolia Electric Co.,” the seventh album from Songs: Ohia, was a total revelation. It was the album that the Pitchfork crowd had been waiting for — a leap from Will Oldham does Karate to Neil Young does Whiskeytown. Its midwest grandeur — the lap steel, the mandolin, the Wurlitzer and, especially, those major minor electric guitars — was startling. It was an album with swagger, as bracing musically as it was unflinching lyrically. “The Magnolia Electric Co.” contains just eight songs, but — oh — what a bunch. Songs about the labors of love and the love of labor. Songs about highways and moons and betrayals. But, also, that one about life and death.
“Farewell Transmission” is a perfect song. It’s the sort of song that would be most any artist’s greatest achievement. It’s almost a wonder that Bob Dylan didn’t write it. But, in fact, it’s a better life and death song than anything in the Dylan songbook. Recently, I was reminded by Timothée Chalamet that, in 1961, on his debut album, Dylan included a cover of “Fixin’ to Die Blues” by Bukka White. Dylan’s version goes:
Look over yonder, to that buryin' ground
Sure seems lonesome, Lord when the sun goes down
Feelin' funny in my eyes Lord, I believe I'm fixin' to die, fixin' to die
Twelve years later, Bob took another go at the subject on what many consider to be the definitive rock song about death:
Mama take this badge from me
I can't use it anymore
It's getting dark too dark to see
Feels like I'm knockin' on Heaven's door
But thirty years later Jason Molina exceeded both of Dylan passes. “Farewell Transmission” is existentially honest in ways that writers not named Hemingway or Camus rarely are. In consecutive verses, in his reedy tenor, Molina sings:
I will try and know whatever I try
I will be gone but not forever
And then:
The real truth about it is no one gets it right
The real truth about it is we're all supposed to try
But then, somehow, he manages to exceed his own timeless tao with a couplet as staggering as any in the Rock idiom:
Mama here comes midnight with the dead moon in its jaws
Must be the big star about to fall
If quoting lyrics is a hobby for dorks (it is), then I surely I’m a dork (I am). But, also, I’m not alone. And also also, “Farewell Transmission” is the one. It’s the song that most fans point to as Molina’s apex. It’s the one that has been streamed tens of millions of times from a band who, while alive, struggled to sell even ten thousand records. In the end, it didn’t matter. Or rather, it only mattered so much. Great as it was, “The Magnolia Electric Co.” didn’t re-chart the trajectory of Molina’s career. Which is not to say that the balance of his discography lacks luster. To the contrary, Molina’s solo albums are consistently excellent and his work as Magnolia Electric Co. (the band) ranges from very good to excellent. There are dozens of songs that Molina recorded after 2003 which would be crowning achievements for most any other songwriter. But most songwriters didn’t write “Farewell Transmission.”
Also, it wasn’t a creative regression. More than his work quality faltered, Molina’s health suffered. The second half of the Aughts were restless, sickly times for the singer, who bounced between the U.K. and the U.S., from rehab to farm to odd job and back to rehab. In hindsight, the miracle is not what Songs: Ohia achieved at their peak, but that Molina remained prolific for so long while in the grips of terminal alcoholism. In time, however, the virtuous creative cycle turned vicious. After years of short lived sobrieties, erratic concerts and cancelled tours, Molina was a man who needed to work to survive, but who’d lost his career along the way. He released no new music between the summer of 2007 and the summer of 2009. And he released nothing between the end of 2009 and December 30, 2013, when he was laid to rest at the age of thirty-nine.
In life, Jason Molina was a tireless worker, an itinerant husband, a dear friend, a glorious singer, a yarn spinner and a lonely drunk. But he was never famous. He was barely sub-popular, if he was even that. In death, however, Molina has settled somewhere between Townes Van Zandt and Nick Drake — in the realm of too young to die but also too sensitive for this world singer-songwriters. Van Zandt’s legacy was ultimately preserved by other artists performing his songs. Drake’s was eventually resuscitated by a Volkswagon commercial. But Jason Molina’s was quickly reclaimed by the blogosphere.
Obviously I am (only slightly) kidding. Molina’s legacy was ensured by the depth and breadth of his music, lovingly tended to by the folks at Secretly Canadian. Since his death, Molina has been the subject of multiple reissues, rarities collections and archival live albums. He’s been the subject of several tribute albums and countless covers. On Spotify, he has more than a handful of tracks that have been streamed millions of times, figured befitting internationally renowned, rather than sub-popular acts. Molina’s posthumous success is not unusual — death has resurrected many great artists over the years. But Molina’s death feels different. Yes — dIfferent from Townes Van Zandt and Nick Drake. But also different from early suicides (Cobain, Smith, Curtis) or overdoses (Hendrix, Winehouse, Joplin). More than a decade removed, Molina’s death still feels both inevitable and impossible to explain — like something he actively forewarned and something that we still cannot fathom.
Despite his unfathomability, it sometimes feels like fans have spent the last decade trying to explain Jason Molina. If Fallout Boy were products of MySpace and Bieber got big from Youtube and Lana Del Ray from Tumblr and Lil Nas X via Tik Tok, then the ghost of Jason Molina has been endlessly exalted through long form blog posts (like this). The web is littered with deep-sighing, hand-wringing, heart-swelling think pieces (like this) about Molina. His not insignificant Reddit group points to eulogy after eulogy and heady reconsideration after heady reconsideration. And just three and a half years after his passing, Erin Osmon published “Jason Molina: Riding with the Ghost.” The excellently written, diligently researched biography surprised me for two very obvious reasons. First, in that it amounted to an exorbitant amount of work (and love) for a recently deceased artist who was neither commercially viable nor cultishly obsessed over. And second, because of the “truthiness” of its subject. Molina was a legendary liar — exaggerator or embellisher or whatever more generous euphemism one might employ — suggesting that it might be hard to discern facts from the fiction.
Ultimately, I suspect that Osmon took on the project for the very same reason that so many of us have written about Molina since he died — because his songs compelled us to respond. And between the biography which captured the facts and the think pieces that explored the feelings, Molina’s importance has recently burgeoned. Beyond the My Morning Jacket and Waxahatchee covers and beyond the high end vinyl reissues are countless more casual, mostly private mentions. It seems to me that, for every one person who saw the sallow, little man struggle his way through concerts twenty years ago, there are a hundred more who now recognize “Farewell Transmission” as a perfect song and “The Magnolia Electric Co.” as an undeniable masterpiece. Spotify, Reddit, Squarespace and Substack (though mostly Spotify) have all been boons for the ghost of Jason Molina. In 2013, a small but loyal cadre of fans mourned him. But in 2025, millions celebrate him.
That all being said, in my experience when people talk about Molina, they mostly are talking about Songs: Ohia. And when they talk about Songs: Ohia they are mostly talking about the end of act one — “The Magnolia Electric Co.” (the unimpeachable choice) and “The Lioness” (the bewitching romantic one) and “Didn’t It Rain” (the dark and lonely one). I suppose that occasionally I’ve met those who point to the start of act one — to “The Black Album” or “Axxess & Ace” — as prideful evidence of early adoption. And once in a blue moon maybe I hear something about the beginning of act two — about Magnolia Electric Co. (the band) and “The Dark Don’t Hide It” and “The Sojourner” box set with its four CDs, and bonus DVD and its wooden case and celestial map and medallion. But mostly it’s about the end of act one and, of course, the tragic third act — when Molina was not making music but rather missing, or rehabbing or farming, either drinking himself to death or trying to avoid drinking himself to death.
But there’s this other part of the plot that has always interested me and which I’ve little knowledge of. And that’s 2009 — the end of the second act — when Molina returned from a couple of sickly, wayward years and found just enough resolve to record his final albums. The last record Molina ever made was “Molina and Johnson,” a low stakes collaboration with the Texas painter and songwriter, Will Johnson, released in November of 2009. About a year earlier, though, Molina reassembled The Magnolia Electric Co. in Steve Albini’s Electric Audio for what would become their final album. Several months later, “Josephine,” was released to a mix of tempered hopes, commercial sighs and critical ambivalence.
Between the sprawling “Sojourner” box (much of which was recorded in 2005 and 2006) and “Jospehine,” Jason Molina was in a very bad way. Unable to sustain sobriety, and without proper health care or a steady home, the singer had bottomed out in a way that he’d previously avoided. Which is to say that his return to the studio in late 2008 was a minor miracle. At the same time, the sessions were held under the pall of an even greater tragedy — Evan Farrell, Magnolia Electric Co’s touring bassist, had died in a fire just before Christmas in 2007, at the age of thirty-two.
Significant portions of “Josephine’s” recording were captured by Ben Schreiner for his seventy minute documentary, appropriately entitled “Recording Josephine.” In it Molina looks surprisingly fresh. But also, “fresh” is relative in this case. He was trimmer. He’d regained some color. His eyes seemed clearer. But, on the other hand, Molina — who was not yet thirty-five at the time — had lost most of his hair, taken to wearing bolo ties, and sunken into his short, weary frame. For a seventy year old man, he appeared fantastic. For a man who’d taken terrible care of himself for more years, he looked better than expected. But, as a thirty-something who needed to lead a band through a recording session before then, presumably, hitting the road for a world tour, Jason Molina appeared to be just barely treading water. He looked almost exactly like a man who once sang: “The real truth about it is no one gets it right / The real truth about it is we're all supposed to try.”
Interviews with Molina bookend the film. In conversation, he is engaged and articulate, charming and polite. He’s both the conductor of the recordings and also happy to be just one of the guys. As the story unfurls, however, he begins to fade from the lens. Steve Albini takes on chunks of narration. As does guitarist (and erstwhile sax man) James Groth. As does the memory of Evan Farrell. Midway through the film, Molina is still hard at work in the studio but has ostensibly receded from the story. More than a decade removed, I’m left with the nagging sense that what we are not seeing is the actual story of “Josephine.” That Molina was struggling to be present. That he was disappearing in real time. That he was loving and working somewhere between the bar and the afterlife.
By the time of “Josephine’s” release, Jason Molina was almost completely out of the picture. Those who were still following along understood that while Molina might always be the patron saint of Secretly Canadian Records, Justin Vernon was the prodigal son of the Secretly Canadian Empire. And that while Jason Isbell might have looked upon Molina with reverence, Americana’s new “It Boy” had bested his predecessor in the popularity contest. Molina was neither as new as Vernon nor as sociable as Isbell. Meanwhile, those same critics who were suspicious of Molina’s Classic Rock turn in 2003 were now disenchanted with his dialed down Americana in 2009. Reviews of “Josephine” were respectful but not glowing and sales were middling. In the end, Molina’s return proved to be shaky and short lived. Soon after “Josephine’s” release, he cancelled tour plans for “health issues.” And over the next three years, aside from the occasional rumor or warning flare, Jason Molina was basically a living ghost.
At the time, I obviously had no idea that “Josephine” was the end. Had I known, surely I would have paid more attention. And yet, since Molina’s passing, I’ve never revisited the record. I suppose that there was something about hearing him so close to death — both Farrell’s and his own — that felt uncomfortable, if not a little lurid. Photographs of Molina from that time — in his nineteenth century gentleman attire — recalled images of Civil War soldiers lost in battle. Plus, he’d released so much music. There was so much Jason Molina to love. And so, I guess at some point I decided that “Jospehine” either didn’t need or didn’t warrant my affection. Or, more likely, that I was not ready to really hear it. Or, if I am being completely honest, that I was afraid to hear it. That it might sound like the end.
In fact, “Josephine” does not sound like the end at all. “Farewell Transmission” sounds like the end. “Hold on Magnolia” sounds like the end. “Jospehine” sounds like the afterlife. And not just because Molina likes to sing about ghosts and loves lost and regrets and sunsets and lonely highways. But because the record never strays too far or cuts too deep. It just floats slightly above the ground, unfurling at a languid pace. Sometimes a slow waltz. Sometimes without any discernible rhythm at all. There’s an effortless quality to the record that betrays its meticulous craft. Everything feels “live” but also not totally “alive.” Meanwhile, and to my surprise, Molina sounds less gripped — less broken. His tenor glides rather than pierces. Plus, there’s a timelessness to the entire affair. These are songs that could have been written in 2007 or 1997 or 1977 or 1867. Some sound like classic Country ballads. Some sound like nineteenth century folk songs. Some sound like ancient hymns. It’s like everything else Molina did before and also clearly different. Death doesn’t hang over “Josephine” because it’s already passed.
The trio that opens the album — ”O! Grace,” “The Rock of Ages” and the title track — are as lovely as anything Molina ever wrote. They unfurl gently and patiently, gilding their sweet melodies with church choirs, high school horns and a comfort that requires deep trust and acceptance. Molina’s voice is naturally the main attraction, but also it’s a tired and slightly attenuated version of its former self. It still possesses the necessary range, but its weariness suggests both great strain and tenderness. The band sounds like old buddies gathered to pay tribute to the friend they lost. And while that friend might have been Evan Farrell, it was most certainly Jason Molina.
Once it settles in, “Josephine” surveys the multitudes of its mercurial frontman. “Shenandoah” and “Whip-poor-will” are anachronisms — tender updates of songs that Molina could have written years — or even centuries — before. Meanwhile, “Handing Down” and “Map of the Falling Sky” share the stark, dark, storm’s a coming haunt of early Songs: Ohia. But in this new context, and alongside the Americana fare, Molina’s gifts come into sharp focus. His greatest gift was not his voice or his knack for gothic metaphor or his existential meditations. It was his singular capacity to assimilate Post-Rock and Slowcore — genres not known for their warmth, heart and soul — into Classic Rock, Folk Rock and Country Rock. And, yes, it was also the gothic metaphors and the existential meditations. And, of course, it was always his voice.
Whereas most of his previous albums contained eight or nine tracks, “Josephine” had fourteen — which I think is meaningful. For one thing, it indicates that, having spent so much time away, Molina had pent up creativity. Its relative girth also suggests a looseness, which is the opposite of tightness, which implies that not all of the songs are, in the strictest sense, necessary. Lovely as it is, the record does plod a bit in the second half. And while no song stretches far past four minutes, “Josephine” does drift. If timelessness is a feature of his music, pacing can sometimes be his bug. But Molina seems to know as much, which is why — on three occasions — he brings everything back to the titular refrain. After her introduction in song three, Josephine reappears at the album’s midpoint in “Hope Dies Last” and again in its swan song, “An Arrow in the Gale.” The leitmotif is effective — it stitches things together and returns us to that down-tuned chord which, according to Molina, was the inspiration for the entire album. Not Farrell. Or his ghost. Or any ghost for that matter. But rather how the name “Josephine” played against the magic chord he’d discovered.
In the last moments from the last song on the last Magnolia Electric Co. record, we hear the singer return to that name and that chord while his bandmates whisper “run, run, run.” Their words are not a warning. They are an emancipation. They are more of a farewell than any goodbye I’ve ever heard. And they are a reminder of why I spent so long avoiding this album and why I ultimately needed to return to it. Because “Josephine” was not the end of a life. It was Jason Molina being set free. It was the beginning of his death.