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Damien Jurado is a man with a hand in the baskets of all the right fringe genres. He can be the storyteller who produced the alt folk masterpiece "Rehearsals For Departure" - one of Uncut and NME's Albums Of The Year - and the sonic pioneer responsible for "Postcards And Audio Letters", a music free album of telephone conversations, answering machine messages and boom-box Christmas recordings. As a result he's won a reputation as one of America's most adventurous artists and is regarded by his musical peers as a songwriter of immense capabilities. "On My Way To Absence" is the result of Jurado and long-time collaborator Eric Fisher locking themselves away for four months of musical polarity. Described by Damien as 'a tribute to jealousy', it's a collection of songs that sound as if they've been stoked in the fires of time - and captures, in a similar manner to the best of Nick Cave and Gillian Welch, a particular primal essence in the way a tale is spun. This is his great strength as a writer - the ability to find the quick truth, the good stuff, and then to sing it from his gut.