The Lowliest One began as a lone voice and a resonator guitar in upstate New York—quiet songs in open D minor, written somewhere between reflection and ruin. Over time, those spare beginnings grew heavier, darker, more distorted. Suitcase drums became foot-triggered samplers; soft folk became something raw and elemental. The songs didn’t get louder—they got closer to the bone.

The project has since evolved into a trio: Peter Siegmann (founder, guitar, vocals, drums), Zoots Houston (pedal steel), and Mike Maroney (synth). There’s no bass player. Instead, the low end pulses through subharmonic synth layers and warbled patches that hum like forgotten engines under the floor. The pedal steel doesn’t play licks—it wails through a pedalboard like a haunted theremin. Siegmann still plays guitar and drums at the same time, controlling layers of beats with a custom SPD-SX rig at his feet. The sound is stitched together from ruin and intention: part folk ritual, part broadcast from a signal no one’s sure is still live.

Their upcoming album, Cascades, follows the unraveling of a man—false summits, flickers of hope, the dull ache of watching yourself fade out in real time. It moves through people-watching and paranoia, self-loathing and spiritual rot. By the final track, one line repeats until it folds into static: nothing matters anymore.

Based in Kingston, NY, The Lowliest One plays in strange rooms and unlit corners—anywhere the sound can echo and the tension can hold. Their music isn’t nostalgic. It remembers something that maybe never happened. Songs from the edge of a burned-out county line. Music for the last room with a light on.