Eric Arn has spent the last three or four decades in the service of the experimental guitar, early on as part of Wayne Rogers’ Crystallized Movements, later in his own deep droning, electrified Primordial Undermind and now in this mostly acoustic blues-folk infused set of solo material, partly improvised and partly composed. These songs run the gamut from buoyant, bucolic, fingerpicked transcendentalism to tetchy, twitchy, untethered shows of digital skill, with one space-age foray into electric guitar psychedelia at the end.
In the quieter, more melodic entries, Arn sounds a good bit like Basho, washing homespun folk melodies in a luminous mystical light. “Wer Tauben füttert, füttert Gespenster” which translates as “Whoever feeds pigeons, feeds ghosts” is perhaps the best of these, a placid, gentle rain of notes that taps into something spiritual without making too much of it. “6 or 7 Adepts” is knottier and less serene. It leaves lots of space for meditation, hazarding a spray of notes, then a pause for contemplation. We have time to consider the intervals between the music. Phrases tilt upwards like question markets and are answered by muted bursts. The piece seems like an internal inquiry, as Arn picks his way carefully through it. There is a provisional quality to the way it resolves, as if he were just deciding what it means for himself.
Elsewhere, tracks veer further from folk tradition. “Warpage in the Figures,” molds blues-y bends into abstract shapes, agitated sound running sprints, then stopping to pant and recovery. It is less melodic than the other tracks, but full of a brainy aggression; you can imagine strings being broken in its rush towards revelation.
The disc closes with “Greets the Dawn,” for someone who has admittedly not kept up all that well, the track that most recalls Arn’s work with Primordial Undermind. Here tones build slowly in vibrating atmospheres. A sense of wonder is palpable. It puts into relief how densely full of notes and ideas all the previous tracks were, and how stillness can evoke just as much as busyness.
