If last year’s GUITARWORKS felt like John Beckmann’s first steps into a strange and resonant new landscape, GUITARWORKS II feels like he’s dug deeper into the soil, brushed off the dust, and started mapping out the ruins. The Mortal Prophets’ new release is less an “album” in the conventional sense and more like a series of sonic postcards from places most people have forgotten about—or never even knew existed.

Every track here is named after a pre-Columbian site—Chaco Canyon, Cahokia Mounds, Serpent Mound—and the music feels appropriately ghostly. These aren’t big, sweeping, cinematic guitar showcases; they’re miniature rituals. None of them crack four minutes, yet each one hangs in the air like incense. The guitar is the center, but Beckmann uses it more like a brush dipped in reverb, layering tones until they shimmer into something that feels half-eroded, half-eternal.

What’s striking is how quiet the record is. Not boring quiet, but that kind of deep listening quiet that makes you notice the space around the notes as much as the notes themselves. It’s in the lineage of Eno’s early ambient work, Fripp’s looping experiments, or even the slow-motion cathedral drones of Stars of the Lid. But it’s not derivative—it’s Beckmann’s own language, rooted in a very American sense of sacred geography. You can hear the weight of stone, the wind over plains, the mythic residue of rituals long dissolved by time.

Compared to GUITARWORKS I, this one is stripped of the bluesy detours and vocals—it’s pure atmosphere. You don’t so much listen to it as inhabit it. Stick on a good pair of headphones, let it play at twilight, and suddenly your apartment turns into an archaeological site. It’s not background music, but it also doesn’t demand attention—it rewards it.

There’s a warmth to the production too—vintage amps, analog effects—that makes the whole thing feel handmade. Imperfect in the best way. It sits somewhere between reverence and decay.

For fans of William Basinski, Cluster & Eno, or anyone who wants music that feels like a slow exhale, GUITARWORKS II is a rare find. It’s meditative without being sterile, mystical without being pretentious. More than anything, it feels like Beckmann is offering us a map to places we can’t visit physically but can still wander through in sound.

“GUITARWORKS II” is available now on all major streaming platforms

Listen to Mortal Prophets and other similar artists on our Spotify Playlist ‘New Music Spotlight - Indie & Alternative’

“GUITARWORKS II” - Mortal Prophets

“ADAGIO GROOVES” - Peter Xifaras