IN January 2022, on the night of the year’s first full moon, Phosphorescent released acover of Randy Newman’s “Bad News From Home”, which kicked off an unusual project that nearly derailed sessions for Revelator. He released anew cover every synodic month, including some familiar songs by Bob Dylan (a deconstructed “Like ARolling Stone”) and Fleetwood Mac (a lovely “Storms”) as well as lesser-known tunes by Vic Chesnutt (a sardonic “Parade”) and Tom THall (a tragically selfdelusional “Homecoming”). In 2023, Matthew Houck collected them all on anew album called The Full Moon Project.
It was supposed to be afast, fun diversion, something he could work on casually as a warm-up for anew album of originals. “I knew Iwas going to make Revelator. I hadn’t written the songs yet, but Ithought I would be able to do the covers pretty quickly. I’d finish them up in February, then put one out every month while Iworked on the new album for the remainder of the year. But Iended up working on those songs right up until the night before the final full moon in December. Something would always get in the way.