Over the last 60 years,
East Meets West recordings have become somewhat commonplace in creative music. While
John Coltrane,
Yusef Lateef, and
Ahmed Abdul-Malik all experimented with Eastern sounds in the creation of jazz during the 1950s, the
Joe Harriott/
John Mayer Indo-Jazz Suite in 1966 and
Yehudi Menuhin and
Ravi Shankar's first effort at melding formal classical tradition and improvisation in 1967 became landmarks. With
Invisible Strings, guitarists
Eraldo Bernocchi and
Prakash Sontakke add a remarkable entry to a long list.
Bernocchi is virtually unclassifiable as a musician, composer, and producer. Some of his working partnerships include exercises with
Mick Harris,
Bill Laswell,
Harold Budd,
Toshinori Kondo,
Manabu Hiramoto,
Balazs Pandi,
Jamie Saft, and
Obake.
Sontakke has appeared on albums by
Narada Michael Walden,
Food (
Iain Ballamy and
Thomas Stronen) and
Raghu Dixit.
Bernocchi's lap steel guitar playing is the prime melodic force on these nine pieces and reflects the influences of Carnatic music, Bollywood, spaghetti western soundtracks, and the melodic improvisation tradition.
Bernocchi plays baritone and electric guitars and electronics. He places his abundant abilities in service to
Sontakke's labyrinthine harmonic creations. Ambient music informs each of these tracks, but the emphasis of percussion and haunted lyricism adds quiet drama that creates depth and heft, not merely ethereality. Pronounced plodding beats, strummed chords, and interplay between baritone and steel guitars are hallmarks in the foreboding "The Last Emperor Walked Alone." "From Star to Star," with its wordless choral vocal samples in the intro and syncopated layers of dubby rhythmic pulses, frames an active conversation between the guitarists in subtle, sweet yet poignant melodies that possess a song-like architecture. "Bangalor Electric" offers pronounced electronic snare beats and breaks atop hypnotic electric fingerpicked guitar vamps as
Sontakke punctuates and paints them. The use of digital delay, drum and bass beats, and baritone guitar basslines on "Purple Yello" offers an elegant freneticism for the lap steel;
Sontakke decorates sparsely but effectively. Taken as a whole, it offers the sound of motion looking past itself. Its sonic landscape circles wider with each pass until it swallows everything in its path to become a solitary, nearly exultant voice. The imagination at work on
Invisible Strings is revelatory. These two men use only what its necessary to communicate and create musical "stories" that resonate far beyond each track's prescribed length. Each selection maintains a distinct identity that contributes to the seamless flow of the whole. The music balances cinematic qualities while remaining subjectively intimate. This 21st century addition in the
East Meets West canon acts not only as a shining example of what is possible when two open-minded talents from different cultures enter into creative dialogue, but as a complete realization of said encounter's potential. ~ Thom Jurek
