Arkansas native Kendl Winter and Minnesota native Palmer T. Lee came together as The Lowest Pair after years of pursuing their own musical projects. They’ve continued to maintain some musical independence while also releasing a string of albums together that showcase their earthy acoustic sound centered on clawhammer banjo and guitar with a dash of punk aesthetic. In 2020 the duo spent time with another acoustic duo, Small Town Therapy, and ended up collaborating on an album, released in 2022, called Horse Camp. In contrast with the more song-focused The Lowest Pair, Small Town Therapy, featuring Leif Karlstrom and Adam Roszkiewicz, focuses more on instrumentals and improvisation. The quartet joined us in the studio on June 21, 2023, to talk about how the Covid-19 pandemic shutdowns gave them the opportunity to collaborate, and how they approached combining their disparate musical approaches. They performed songs from Horse Camp as well as one from the Lowest Pair's previous release, The Perfect Plan.
Karlstrom, a volcanologist as well as a musician, mentioned that he was featured on Duluthian Gaelynn Lea's Sunday Sessions series on YouTube.