Since the release of Saddleback’s acclaimed 2004 debut Everything’s A Love Letter, Tony has found increasing demand for his touch behind the recording desk. Tony’s studio is housed in his Kangaroo Valley residence on the south coast of New South Wales. Found inside are all sorts of instruments including various guitars, percussion makers, horns, a clarinet, a double bass, piano and a specially-fashioned drum set. Having arranged and played these on other peoples’ work – most notably for Sydney’s Holly Throsby – Tony fashions his own sound into an altogether different, personal realm. The remote surroundings tell heavily on the sounds he creates for Saddleback, and as its title suggests, Night Maps has a darker sense of beauty than its predecessor. The uncanny atmospheres of Night Maps are the result of contrasting feels at play. Sounds push and pull against each other, then unite into a mysterious force that is by turns desolate, fragile, visceral and translucent. These abstracted orchestrations featuring guitar, strings, woodwinds, brass, percussion and electronic textures work in the cracks between jazz, folk, post-rock and classical, claiming a space between dark and light, both shimmering and haunting. Night Maps is a breathtaking, artful work. (Label info)