Paolo Angeli

An amazing record. It’s beautifully recorded and almost impossible to believe that such a layered and polyphonic music, with chords, percussion, lead lines, bass lines, harmonies, string sections and sometimes voice could all be produced by one person in real time, without overdubs or loops. But it is. The instrument, a specially designed and augmented Sardinian guitar (almost the size of a cello) is equipped with motors, pedals, individual string mic’ing, and extra appendages; and of course there are the usual pedal-driven effects, intelligently and sparingly used. It’s a record – and a music – that defies all description, except to say that it’s tuneful, inventive, surprising, harmonically rich, generically diverse and sonically jaw-dropping. If you don’t know Paolo Angeli yet, buy this; it’s a masterpiece.