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Jeff Pearce continues to exhibit a calm confidence over his abilities. Throughout the course of Follow the River Home (52'51") we will venture from the basic trembling of the air to a quickening of our consciousness. His work takes hold of us - speaking in a way in which words cannot. We feel a verging as Pearce releases imagery in seven studies on the beauty of musical timbre. In some places a stimulant, in others a tranquilizer, his audience easily follows the moral instruction of the music. The richness of tone - its intelligence, its casual precision - is felt from the first note. Generating a flux of musical expectations, Pearce raises anticipation at every turn. His use of digital processing, interspersed with clean playing, allows the vibrations emanating from his electric guitar to morph, swirl and assume a new identity. Filtered electronically this sound first begins as sympathetic resonation, in the generation of unexpected overtones. The resulting masterful formations are stirring exchanges of texture and atmosphere, resulting in distinctive moods and spirits. At many points during Follow the River Home, a coherent soloing plucks and picks through arpeggiated chords, and undergoes harmonic transitions gradually - as this shapely music activates our minds just as much as it flutters our hearts. Big chords then roll in through deep reverberation, possibly transporting the mind to a higher than normal level of integration. Three of the tracks express themselves in undulating swells of notes, generating the album's most spacey moments. There is a sonic glory here, as Pearce expresses some dark impulses... and then hope. He plays this music to light up the least grain of being in us - often finding our still point, and the deeper relations that hold this music together.
- Chuck van Zyl/STAR'S END 21 July 2016 |
