ER JURKEN - To Be Continued

"To Be Continued" is one of those records that forces an instant career recap of its author, ER Jurken, whose 2021 debut slipped past even the most diligent listeners and critics on the lookout for new creative territory (myself included).

Born in Milwaukee and welcomed into Chicago's music scene, ER Jurken plays with the trio Junegrass, who released an excellent album in 2025 that was likewise largely overlooked. ER Jurken is the prototypical anti-star, an Andy Partridge with a slightly less mocking gaze, delighting in subverting the rules of highbrow pop through a series of seemingly whimsical flights of fancy that conceal a deep understanding of the mechanisms and the genius that has always ennobled American music, in the vein of Van Dyke Parks.

"To Be Continued" is a record that, from its very title, betrays an ambition to lay the groundwork for even shrewder and more surprising excursions to come. "In Monterey" is a track that doesn't just open the album, but also keeps at bay the devotees of overly precious sophisticated pop and chamber-folk. ER Jurken proves himself a skilled practitioner of compositional strategies rooted in the more rock'n'roll side of Elton John – as shown by the midtempo of the aforementioned "In Monterey" – or in country–western extravagances (the unruly "Main Man"), venturing into the realm of psychedelia with equal candor and imagination (the gorgeous garage-rock-psych of "Mighty And Concelead").

"To Be Continued" is an all-around excursion that takes in melodic, romantic flourishes of rare grace (the reflective piano-ballad "Lady Of Renown"), gentle unions with a string section ("So, Surprise"), acrobatic power-pop dressed up as glam and folk ("Uncle Denny" and "I Do"), chamber-folk that could have come straight off a Left Banke record ("Morning Paper"), and dense digests of American music encompassing Bob Dylan and Neil Young ("A Good Place To Fall") as well as Wilco on "All The Way To Georgia".

ER Jurken may not have the phisique du role to grab the public's attention, but if you prefer intelligence, irony and a touch of disenchantment to the self-indulgent showmanship of so many contemporary artists, you've found the right record to make peace with the word pop.

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16/02/2026