There has been a lot of talk in recent years, a lot of it on this site admittedly, about solo guitarists who borrow from some of the more forward-thinking folk guitarists from the late 1960s onwards. New adjectives have been fashioned, some by me admittedly, words like Fahey-esque and Kottke-ish and Basho-vian. Actually I probably made at least one of those up right now, and another may in fact be a Dr Who monster, but you know what I mean. The Tompkins Square label have taken it upon themselves to be the curators of this scene, arranging works by some of the old masters alongside the newer artists on the walls of the Imaginational Anthem gallery. Volume 1 juxtaposed Sandy Bull with Jack Rose, Volume 2 was bookended by James Blackshaw and Robbie Basho, and Volume 3 found space for both Richard Crandell and Greg Davis. The links having been drawn, Volume 4 sticks to the new breed, with some less familiar names; digging a little deeper in the attic to uncover some relatively recent masterpieces.
Volume 4 is subtitled “New Possibilities, and indeed around half of the names on Volume 4 are new to me. Sometimes this is because they are better know as being members of bands rather than as solo artists: for example, William Tyler plays with Lambchop and Silver Jews, and Tyler Ramsay is in Band Of Horses. Conversely, I’m more familiar with Philadelphia’s Chris Forsyth’s solo work than I am with his involvement in Peeesseye and various other group ventures, mainly thanks to his excellent Dreams album last year. That record drew from the minimalist classical well as much as from folk, and the hypnotic, droning, circular nature of “Paranoid Cat”, featured here, is of a similarly curious yet precise construction. English guitarist C Joynes (pictured above), who I’ve now seen him play in support of both Sir Richard Bishop and Josephine Foster, has a pure technique which produces something that sounds like a folk standard, a timeless jig (are there words to “Jemmy Steel”? There should be). Some of those I’ve never heard of insult my ignorance by coming up with some of the best performances: I like the rawness of Sam Moss’s “Miniature Dwellings II”, tethered as it is to a thick, buzzing guitar string, and the resonance (both sonic and emotional), of Mike Fekete’s “Birds On The Lake”, using his twelve string guitar to paint a beautiful landscape, reminiscent most obviously of the better-known James Blackshaw. However, the one which makes the biggest impression on me is Nick Jonah Davis’s compelling “San Cristobal De Las Casas”, its deep dark spaces contrasting starkly with the compositions surrounding it.
Ten artists, all mixing these colours in subtly different ways, applying them to their own canvases, but always with spellbinding technique. Imaginational Anthem Volume 4 is available now from Tompkins Square on lovely gatefold LP.
1 comment
October 26, 2010 at 10:07 pm
Delta-Slider
Nice review. Many of these guys have great solo stuff they have put out there. You just gotta dig for it. I’ll have some interviews posted with some of them in a week or two. Check it out.