Advance listen for Disappearing Ink's The Charm of Abstraction, out June 1, 2023.

Disappearing Ink is a project of Lawrence Lanahan, a Baltimore journalist and nonfiction author (The Lines Between Us: Two Families and a Quest to Cross Baltimore's Racial Divide). Lanahan chose the moniker Disappearing Ink as motivation to not be defined by the last thing he created. The driving guitar trio and jazz harmonies of 2014's There Is No Time and Nothing's Been gave way to 2020’s Surprises, which added electric piano, hit harder, and flirted with psychedelia. RECOUNT, a 2021 EP, brought dark grooves to a reflection on the paranoia that blanketed America in 2020.

On The Charm of Abstraction, Lanahan returns to his songwriting roots, but abandons the guitar, his primary instrument. The result is a wild album that reflects Lanahan’s songwriting from a cracked electronic mirror: intricate programmed beats, mesmerizing synths, imaginative samples. Nonetheless, the core songwriting voice critics recognized all the way back on his folky 2004 debut EP—the “melodic and lyrical invention,” the “chilling chord progressions,” the “rare honesty and power”—comes through.

The album title comes from Jean Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation, and the album radiates hyperreality, from GPS-inspired album art to the cover of Dionne Warwick’s “You’re Gonna Need Me,” itself a nod to J Dilla’s chopped take on her tune on his album Donuts. The dancefloor headtrip of “Take Five No Four No Three” evokes a robot percussion troupe, and lead single “See My Life” narrates a midlife crisis over a pastiche of guitar feedback, samples of home-recorded drums, and synth washes. In “Die Laughing,” Lanahan rhymes a warning that we are “entertaining ourselves to death” over rhythmic samples of his own laughter. In the music on this album, as Baudrillard wrote, “…it is no longer a question of either maps or territories. Something has disappeared…”

Lawrence Lanahan has made music in Baltimore for two decades. His sound has been shaped by his love for great songwriters, adventurous arrangers, and free improvisers. He studied jazz with guitarist Carl Filipiak and composition with composer Judah Adashi. Baltimore City Paper shortlisted Disappearing Ink's first record release show as a "don't miss." Maryland Public Television’s ArtWorks noted Lanahan’s “alternately quirky, poignant, and gosh-darn beautiful melodies” and said “his lyrics reveal him to be a student of human nature.” Lanahan's 2004 solo debut EP was played on WRNR, WLOY, WMUC, HOBER Thinking Radio, and Radio Nova Nonsolomusica in Italy. One reviewer called Lanahan “a singer-songwriter with the guts to breathe some life into an otherwise stagnant genre.” Others have praised his “intricately picked guitar work and melodious, thoughtful songs” and “wit, emotion, [and] bizarre narration.” 

Produced by Lawrence Lanahan at Last Session Studio, Baltimore, MD. Mastered by Alan Jones at Laminal Audio, Kitsap County, WA. All songs by Lawrence Lanahan except "You're Gonna Need Me," by Lamont Herbert Dozier, Brian Holland, Edward J. Holland, Richard Wayne Wylie (Gold Forever Music: BMI).

The Charm of Abstraction

How Low Can You Go

Hardly Core

You're Gonna Need Me

Tears Wellin' Up

Ghosts

Cockamamie Cat

Mercy

Take Five No Four No Three

Die Laughing

Disappearing Ink performs at Mum's in Baltimore, 2/23/19.

Mum's 022319

07 The Calvary Cross

Disappearing Ink is a music project from journalist and author Lawrence Lanahan (The Lines Between Us: Two Families and a Quest to Cross Baltimore's Racial Divide). New album The Charm of Abstraction comes out June 1, 2023.

Disappearing Ink

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