5 totally fried guitar albums
There was a time in my life where I kept asking myself a question that I’m sure has occurred to some of you before: is there much more we can do with the guitar? At my most cynical, every moderately popular rock band felt like a retread of stuff I’d already heard. It felt as though all the interesting innovations were occurring in DAWs, and that there wasn’t much you could do to iterate on previously tread sounds.
I recognize this now as a case of the youthful misconception that I somehow had a complete picture of the global musical landscape. The guitar, and by extension the rock band setup, has proven itself to remain pretty limitless as a means of expression. I have to admit that even bands I don’t particularly care for are doing more interesting things with the form now than anything that was happening when I was in high school. I am excited about guitar music more than ever.
To that end, here is a list of a few guitar-heavy albums I think are particularly interesting. This list focuses on albums that have a sound that I’m referring to as “fried”, meaning psychedelic, dissonant, avant-garde, or otherwise just kind of fucked up. That said, I think there’s a lot of beauty to be found in each of these selections too. I hope they get you as excited about six strings as they did me.
The Dead C - The White House
The Dead C are among my favorite bands, ever, in any style. Bruce Russell, Michael Morley and Robbie Yeats are the New Zealand trio responsible for some of the most free-ranging, mesmerizing and beautiful noise rock you’re liable to find. I would co-sign pretty much all of their material, but 1995’s The White House has the distinction of still getting better every time I listen to it. There are some moments with more traditional rock trappings like “a steady drumbeat” and “sort of rhythmic vocals,” but the main selling point are the lengthy, feedback-laden drones, which perfectly evoke the wintry malaise implied by the album art. Even talking about it now, I feel a strong urge to put it on the stereo.
lol coxhill & fred frith - French gigs
I blind-bought this LP at Brooklyn Record Exchange a few years ago with only a vague sense of who Fred Frith was. What a discovery! His jagged, violently jazzy explorations with the band Massacre are essential weirdo guitar music, and his youthful experiments founding the legendary avant collective Henry Cow are, well, legendary. French Gigs is by comparison much more understated. Frith teams up with soprano saxophonist Lol Coxhill for an hour of scuttering free improvisation. The two elements work brilliantly off each other, and while the more raucous moments are perhaps the selling point, I myself am drawn to the percussive clicks and squeaks that precede them.
sightings - arrived in gold
In the face of Sightings’ recorded output, the overwhelming majority of noise rock just can’t compete. The now-inactive NYC-based trio were louder, feedbackier, more aggressive, more acerbic and just plain more than just about everyone. Arrived in Gold numbers among their more extreme efforts, and it’s sometimes hard to believe this consists of traditional rock instrumentation. Harsh, to be sure, but some of the feedback here is just exquisite.
bill orcutt - A History of Every One
It’s probably true to say that Bill Orcutt has been a huge part of my realignment on appreciating the guitar again. I was first introduced to his work in Harry Pussy as a high schooler, but was utterly knocked on my ass by his solo acoustic work. 2013 saw the release of A History of Every One on Editions Mego, a label more known for its experimental electronic oeuvre, and it remains as breathtaking as it was on release. The album sees Orcutt interpreting classic hymns, holiday songs, blues staples and a lot more through his exceptionally expressive acoustic playing. He plays quite hard, and the recording captures all the string noise, buzzing and Orcutt’s Keith Jarrett-esque vocalizations in wonderful detail.
Cyrus Pireh - thank you, guitar
This last entry is also indebted to Orcutt in a different way; he released Cyrus Pireh’s Thank You Guitar through his own Palilalia Records last year. And while it’s certainly in conversation with much of the abstract string explorations of his labelmates, Pireh’s beautifully melodic work feels innovative in a much simpler sense — it has me frequently asking, “How the fuck is he doing that?” It doesn’t exactly get clearer when you watch videos of him playing, where he utilizes a unique and incredibly fast strumming technique atop a flurry of complex fretting. This is someone who is grasping at a total understanding of their instrument and finding purchase. It does not get much more impressive than this.
