Richard Pinhas — Metatron

Guitarist Richard Pinhas build a reputation with his band Heldon with whom he made a piece called In The Wake Of King Fripp. Pinhas playing with looped guitar indeed resembles the ‘Frippertronics’ that the King Crimson guitarist developed.

While Fripp went from the Revox taperecorders to the digital effects and named the result ‘Soundscapes’, Richard Pinhas’s sound stuck closer to the original Frippertronics on his works with both Heldon and his solowork. What all these techniques still share is a certain unpredictability, a life of their own which keeps both guitarists and their listeners intrigued. Fripp’s in-depth linernotes to his Soundscapes CD’s report of how he continues to be captivated by the magic that goes on in the complex textures of guitar signals, swirling around in his Eventide effectprocessors. Likewise Pinhas has named the workings of his guitartapestries after the Kabbalistic archangel Metatron (equated to Enoch, by some). In other words: the realm where Pinhas is no longer making the calls but the divine inspiration takes over.

On Metatron Pinhas’ inspiration from philosopher Gilles Deleuze has been replaced (augmented?) by Kaballah, something that is of course mostly to be found in the titles of the tracks. The tracks themselves are very much in line with what we got to know from his previous works: wavering guitartapestries building from quiet and ambient to massive and stormy. The hypnotic drumrolls (courtesy of Magma-drummer Antoine Paganotti) are often more a means add to the waves that engulf the listener and take you up. In other pieces, like in Moumoune and Mietz in the Sky with Diamonds, a more direct, a more earthly, approach is taken by the use of a driving rockbeat. It turns out to be merely a different path to the same hypnotic goal.

Metatron is a wonderfully hypnotic album in the tradition of prog- and krautrock, still in tune with the times and at best above them. Using the powers of repetition in full effect, not unlike prayer. As an extra bonus there’s a video included on disc one, a extra piece that’s not on the audiopart even, called Tikkun (part 4): Gematria 52vs814.