For more than 20 years the Handsome Family have provided dark, captivating slices of Americana.

And the husband and wife duo can’t quite believe it.

The pair – Brett and Rennie Sparks – are best known for their track Far From Any Road, which became the theme to hit TV show True Detective.

However they are far more than just that one song, with new album Unseen, which they bring to St Luke’s tonight, their 10th release.

“We’re just thankful to still have an audience,” explains Rennie, who sings, is the band’s lyricist and plays both bass and the banjo.

“It’s not an easy time to survive as a band. We survive on the kindness of our fans because we know they don’t need to buy our music anymore (because of online streaming services) and yet they do. It’s become a very meaningful exchange.”

Unseen, their latest release, has Gothic Americana running through it, with Rennie’s lyrics centring around things that are hidden from view, from desert bones bleaching in the sun to the work of William Crookes, who built the first vacuum tube in 1875 with the purpose of detecting spirits in alternate dimensions.

The album was worked upon in the Spark’s own home studio and only at night, although the reason for that is less eerie and more practical.

“It’s because Brett never gets up before the afternoon,” says Rennie.

“Then there’s a long grumbling period of coffee drinking until the night begins and he comes alive.”

Rennie works on the band’s lyrics while Brett focuses on the music. Yet while a listen to the band’s back catalogue might bring up an array of bluegrass, country and murder ballads, the band’s musical influences go a lot deeper than that.

For Unseen, the duo looked to classical music, with the work of Bach providing so much inspiration that Brett even visited Leipzig, where Bach lived and worked for many years.

“Brett’s much more influenced by J.S. Bach than anyone,” says Rennie.

“In his free time that’s all he longs to do— work on playing Bach on the piano. Bach’s music is like a beautiful tapestry you get to watch being woven.”

The tapestry the Handsome Family creates usually has an undercurrent of menace lurking there, too. That made their work perfect for True Detective, the Gothic detective show that used Far From Any Road for its first season, which starred Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson.

Getting a song in a TV show is a great way for a band to get exposure, but it also brings new fans who are only eager to hear what they know from TV.

“It’s been a positive thing,” says Rennie.

“And, of course there are still people who come just to hear that song. Although it used to be that people would all pull out their cell phones to video whenever we played that song. I think we have enough of that on Youtube now.”

The band’s way with words and storytelling style makes them a natural fit in Glasgow.

“I remember wandering in the necropolis with the Rowan trees in bloom the last time we were in Glasgow,” she recalls.

“We’ve been siphoning your music through our little straw all our lives. We love the old stories from the high lonesome places.”

The twosome are known for taking literary inspiration for their work, although Rennie’s answer to what she’s currently interested in might prove a hard one to bring musical life to.

“I’m reading “Other Minds:The Octopus, The Sea and the Deep Origins of Consciousness” by Peter Godfrey-Smith,” she enthuses.

“I can’t recommend it enough. I’m trying to overcome my bias towards thinking with my brain and learn to think with my tentacles and my suckers!”

The Handsome Family, St Luke’s, tonight, sold out, 7pm

JONATHAN GEDDES