SIR RICHARD BISHOP - While My Guitar Violently Bleeds

The way Sir Richard Bishop approaches the american primitive guitar tradition, following in the footsteps of the usual Fahey and Basho, proves, for anyone who still had doubts, that we're dealing with a refined, meticulous, deeply introspective artist (because, after all, what one undertakes in cases like these is an inner search). The former Sun City Girls member has, in short, developed over the years a style that's personal in its own way, here worthily represented by three tracks of differing character, both in quality and inspiration.

The Spanish-tinged feel of "Zurvan", to begin with, certainly has something to do with a certain Django Reinhardt, even if our man's crosscutting taste does everything it can to distort its drive and impertinence with touches of a visionary, imaginary, other western. But it's with the following "Smashana" that we're definitively taken elsewhere, immersed, I'd say hypnotized, by its dark vortex of modulated feedback. It's an experiment in foggy psychedelia, unreal in its alien movements and a close relative of the most ethereal, impalpable dark-ambient (or, if you will, a child of Keiji Haino's most esoteric visions).

The rightly intermediate interlude lets us sink, duly prepared, into the torrential, concluding raga of "Mahavidya", a jumble of ups and downs, broad expanses, bursts of violently bleeding chords and moments of solemn recollection.

All things considered, a record to keep you company, waiting for it to earn, listen after listen, its deserved place in the now-thriving neo-fingerpicking scene.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google

09/07/2007