Natural Information Society has released Perseverance Flow in 2025 via Eremite, Aguirre, and New Soil. The Chicago ensemble, led by composer and multi-instrumentalist Joshua Abrams, returns to its core quartet: Lisa Alvarado (harmonium), Mikel Patrick Avery (drums), Jason Stein (bass clarinet), and Abrams (guimbri).
The album includes a single 37-minute composition, recorded after a year of live performances and shaped in post-production with engineer Greg Norman at Electrical. Abrams deepened studio manipulation compared with earlier records, modifying instruments to mutate sound, color, and time while threading the music through dub’s prism. “Perseverance Flow is skipping rope in slo-mo,” Abrams shared. “A dance of co-operation to rally guts & humors & keep marching through pouring tears.”
The project follows a run of expanded-band double LPs, Mandatory Reality (2018), Descension (Out Of Our Constrictions) (2021), and Since Time Is Gravity (2023).
Since 2010, the group has released seven albums on Eremite and two collaborations with Bitchin’ Bajas on Drag City, earning widespread critical attention across jazz, post-rock, indie, and experimental circles. Recent appearances include Big Ears, Pitchfork Music Festival, Vision Festival, Le Guess Who, and Jazzfest Berlin, alongside performances tied to Alvarado’s visual exhibitions at institutions such as REDCAT, the Wadsworth Atheneum, the Moody Center, and The Kitchen.
Abrams’s résumé includes work with Fred Anderson, Hamid Drake, Nicole Mitchell, Jeff Parker, Matana Roberts, and RP Boo, among many others. His film credits include scores for Life Itself, Abacus: Small Enough To Jail, and The Trials of Muhammad Ali. He also records with Chad Taylor as Mind Maintenance, serves as musical director for The Harvest Time Experiment, and performs in Hamid Drake’s ensemble Turiya: Honoring Alice Coltrane. He received a 2018 grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.