Continuing in my fine tradition of reviewing random jazz records, tonight I found myself grappling with what I would label as progressive jazz-classical-fusion, spearheaded by Norwegian electric guitarist Terje Rypdal. Although I am still not entirely sure what to make of this kind of music, I largely found Rypdal's guitar playing compelling. He has a unique guitar tone; soaring and high-pitched like a David Gilmour, but at the same time, gruff and far more technically proficient. I liked it personally, but I would be remiss not to mention the fact that my girlfriend couldn't abide by the dissonant squeals that Rypdal wrenches from his instrument at times. In short, this kind of music could work as background music, but only if you are weird like me.
For me, although I found the first side to be rather good (especially the one 'short' track "The Hunt"), the side-long title track came off to me as boring, despite being perhaps the only song I have ever heard to fuse jazz, rock and classical all at the same time (indeed it was arranged for electric guitar, strings, and oboe). The result of all this fusion is rather slow to develop, but once I thought of it as basically an ambient piece, I did find it more enjoyable. Ultimately, this is no doubt an interesting record and tonally not far from the deep blue sky depicted on the album cover.
No comments:
Post a Comment