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More reviews of 12 Songs & Blowing the Wind
28 Sep 2010, 19:29
Two recent review-excerpts from a longer feature of *for*sake recordings and Christian Munthe in the Swedish magazine for contemporary music, Nutida Musik:
"12 Songs, in this context, is a fitting complement to the 21st century picture of Munthe, the guitar player. here, he has cleared his throat, turned on the light and brought the guitar back to its common position. It is a return to string playing and a more (if such cursing in the church of improvisation may be allowed) “classic” free improvised guitar, even if Derek Bailey is actually not my obvious reference in this case. Occasionally, the playing that plunges out of the speakers is very fast, layered with interrupted or just commencing chords that stumblingly spurt fragments of something that at a distance might be taken for a blues. Or, rather, if someone had said blues, I would probably not have heard it – but when no one mentions blues, oddly enough, I’m hearing it." Johan Redin, Nutida Musik, No. 2, 2010. (Translated from Swedish by Christian Munthe)
On Blowing the Wind: 11 Etudes for the Archtop Acoustic Guitar:
"This first release on Munthe’s own label is his strongest one so far, from a musical point of view as well as in terms of testing the outer limits of the concept of a guitar. He has comprehensibly explored the backside – so why not the inside? The guitar is used exclusively as a wind instrument, where he, by blowing and breathing into every available opening of the instrument, elicits startling sounds. Sometimes it becomes comical, almost moronic as in BTW No. 4, the snoring in BTW No. 5 or the panting in BTW No. 10. But nothing proceeds in want of honesty. If one sets out into regions of one’s instrument where, I dare to suggest, no one has ventured before, nothing should be ruled out. The murmurs sometimes turn into a form of distorsion or sound as the noise of a radio set in between stations. Had someone played BTW No. 10 to me without telling what it is, I would have guessed on Christine Sehnaoui-Abdelnour or someone among the brightest glowing reductionists. As you know, she plays the saxophone and the fact that the blowing I hear is connected to a guitar can only be viewed as fantastic – for guitar is what Munthe plays, nothing else". Johan Redin, Nutida Musik, No. 2, 2010. (Translated from Swedish by Christian Munthe)
"12 Songs, in this context, is a fitting complement to the 21st century picture of Munthe, the guitar player. here, he has cleared his throat, turned on the light and brought the guitar back to its common position. It is a return to string playing and a more (if such cursing in the church of improvisation may be allowed) “classic” free improvised guitar, even if Derek Bailey is actually not my obvious reference in this case. Occasionally, the playing that plunges out of the speakers is very fast, layered with interrupted or just commencing chords that stumblingly spurt fragments of something that at a distance might be taken for a blues. Or, rather, if someone had said blues, I would probably not have heard it – but when no one mentions blues, oddly enough, I’m hearing it." Johan Redin, Nutida Musik, No. 2, 2010. (Translated from Swedish by Christian Munthe)
On Blowing the Wind: 11 Etudes for the Archtop Acoustic Guitar:
"This first release on Munthe’s own label is his strongest one so far, from a musical point of view as well as in terms of testing the outer limits of the concept of a guitar. He has comprehensibly explored the backside – so why not the inside? The guitar is used exclusively as a wind instrument, where he, by blowing and breathing into every available opening of the instrument, elicits startling sounds. Sometimes it becomes comical, almost moronic as in BTW No. 4, the snoring in BTW No. 5 or the panting in BTW No. 10. But nothing proceeds in want of honesty. If one sets out into regions of one’s instrument where, I dare to suggest, no one has ventured before, nothing should be ruled out. The murmurs sometimes turn into a form of distorsion or sound as the noise of a radio set in between stations. Had someone played BTW No. 10 to me without telling what it is, I would have guessed on Christine Sehnaoui-Abdelnour or someone among the brightest glowing reductionists. As you know, she plays the saxophone and the fact that the blowing I hear is connected to a guitar can only be viewed as fantastic – for guitar is what Munthe plays, nothing else". Johan Redin, Nutida Musik, No. 2, 2010. (Translated from Swedish by Christian Munthe)
