Alan Sparhawk’s new album is a gift to those who grieve

Alan Sparhawk with Trampled by Turtles

Alan Sparhawk & Trampled by Turtles (Sub Pop, 2025)

On November 5, 2022, Mimi Parker died. Singer, songwriter, and drummer of the influential and long-running band Low, mother of two, and wife of fellow bandmate Alan Sparhawk, Parker succumbed to a battle with ovarian cancer at the age of 55. Perhaps one of the most impressive songwriting and performing partnerships of their generation, Parker and Sparhawk held beauty and avant-garde experimentation in breathtaking balance for almost 30 years. The two met in a small town in Minnesota in the fourth grade. In an interview with The New Yorker, Sparhawk notes that he couldn’t quite remember when they started dating in high school, but he remembered exactly when they started making music together. When Parker died, he announced Low had ended because she was its heart.

Grief and the experience of living without a loved one are things American culture avoids. In his new album, Alan Sparhawk shows why this is a mistake. Gathered with longtime friends of the bluegrass band Trampled by Turtles, Sparhawk names with startling vulnerability the feelings of losing a spouse and beloved partner. From the fear of losing all the ways she had made him better in songs such as “Don’t Take Your Light Out of Me” to the heart-wrenching “Screaming Song,” which describes the life-altering moment Mimi died, Sparhawk’s lyrics give the gift of accompaniment to those who have also experienced such pain and loss.

Parker’s presence can be felt beyond just the lyrics of these songs. Not only did she cowrite three of the songs before she died, but their daughter, Hollis, in whose voice are echoes of her mother’s tones, joins Sparhawk for a moving duet on “Not Broken.” Yet a keen ear will observe perhaps the most poignant note: The album has no drums. Mimi was the drummer, and her absence is keenly felt.