Ferran Fages — Al voltant d'un para/.lel

Barcelona-based experimental musician and poet Ferran Fages' previous album Cançons per a un lent retard was a tour the force on acoustic guitar that demanded quite a bit from the listener, or at least myself.

On what could be considered a follow-up, as it's another album as a guitarist while on most of his releases he played electronics and acoustic turntable, he takes a different approach. This time it's an electric guitar for instance, which of course brings a different sound. No effects, just clean guitar, but that's still a different sound. Chords are given a lot of time to ring long, so the resonating harmonics can play in the long pauses. Only towards the end you hear a cough to finally hear an applause after the last piece to make you realise this is a live recording. Some of the pieces are new interpretations/approaches of pieces found on A cavall entre dos cavalls, an album I haven't heard so I can't comment much on that. It's clear though even without that knowledge, that there's a basis, a composition there without being some catchy 'head' on which the player falls back. It's clear though that this is not pure improv.

The almost suffocating mood of Cançons per a un lent retard is not repeated here. That makes Al voltant d'un para/.lel much more accessable, without becoming necessarily 'lightweight', and that's not just the length of only 38 minutes.