Dream Logic

Norwegian guitarist Eivind Asarset has contributed to a number of influential ECM recordings including Nils Petter Molvær’s “Khmer” and “Solid Ether”, Arve Henriksen’s “Cartography”, Andy Sheppard’s “Movements In Colour”, Arild Andersen’s “Elektra”, Jon Hassell’s “Last Night The Moon Came...” and Marilyn Mazur’s “Small Labyrinths”. The aptly-named “Dream Logic” is his first ‘leader’ disc for the label. With its drifting planes of sound-texture, built from layers of processed guitar, sometimes supported by subliminally-throbbing bass, and its otherworldly ambience, it attains an almost hallucinatory quality, underlined by its avoidance of stressed time. Rhythms are as liquid as Aarset’s phrasing. “Dream Logic” is an album of sound-painting which begins with guitar but goes beyond it, moving in mysterious waves. Jan Bang, who is co-composer of a number of the pieces, also contributes sounds and samples, and was the recording producer for sessions at Tjernsbråten, Punkt and Rainbow Studios, aided by frequent collaborator Erik Honoré.

In the pieces heard here, Aarset’s guitar is the starting point, with guitar lines, melodies and textures slowly opened up through the discreet use of samples and programming, developing and expanding the emotional core of the material. Transition points between guitar and electronics are blurred; one is an extension of the other. And Aarset has long since learned to make musical use of his pedals and effects boxes, applying delays and feedback to create a very singing line, ricocheting in a reverberant hall of mirrors to create a sense of deep space. Associations abound: the dark drones of the album’s longest piece, “The Beauty of Decay”, for instance, might suggest affinities with Indian vocal music or perhaps with the world of the Indian-inspired Jon Hassell, whom Aarset has acknowledged as an important source.