Parry/Soegaard: Off The Map (2007)

Glenn Astarita

Senior Contributor since 1997

Longtime contributor to AAJ and Downbeat, Jazz Review, EjazzNews, Radio DirectX.

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Published: April 30, 2007

Off The Map is a good album title, but Out Of The Stratosphere might be appropriate as well. Otherwise, these experimental guitarists gained some notoriety via their collaboration in the avant-garde ensemble known as "hwyl nofio. This album looms as the artists' freshman release within a duo framework.

Other than guitars, Fredrik Soegaard's arsenal includes a MIDI fractal converter, whereas Steve Parry integrates electronics, guitars, preparations, a violin and ukulele into the grand scheme of matters. Consisting of warbling EFX and alien soundscapes, the musicians interweave a steely-edged dreamscape designed with a few meltdowns and drone-centric scenarios.

Perhaps the music serves as an invitation into an unforgiving domain or intimates a sojourn into the other side, but the guitarists do transmit a vibe that generates a sequence of ominous circumstances. Teeming with oscillating swashes of sound and subliminal treatments, the duo pursues cyclical frequencies, supplanted by a sense of darkness throughout many of these ten tracks.

On the piece simply titled "Now, they seemingly employ reverse loops coupled with severely digitized voices, but it's up to the listener's discernment to deconstruct the electronics/instrumentation element. Overall, the musicians use their tools of the trade with great care. It's not cacophonic shock therapy, but more about nourishment for the mind's eye, which in effect, would summon an abundance of neural sensibilities and interpretations.

Track Listing: Off the Map; Unstrung 01; Map; Abstract 0 9; October 2007; Diagram; Space In A Can; Diagram 1978-2056; Now; In A Field.

Personnel: Steve Parry: guitars, ukulele, violin, preparations, adaptations, electronics; Fredrik Soegaard: guitar, MIDI fractal converter, TC FireworX, tambourabox.

Record Label: hwyl records
Style: Beyond Jazz