METZGER, PAUL - Tombeaux

LP version on 180 gram vinyl. CD also available.

Tombeaux, the much-anticipated new album from Paul Metzger, marks our alchemists third appearance on Neros Neptune, following critically-acclaimed contributions to labels like Locust and Honest Jons. Metzger summons the spirits of musical Appalachian forefathers, guitarist Django Reinhardt and classical sitarist Nikhil Banerjee, among others, weaving a peerless, highly individualistic music that sounds unlike anyone but himself. Metzgers playing doesnt imitate raga structures so much as use those modal figures as a starting point. He employs dazzling, breviloquent string-plucks on the main banjo strings, while producing rhythmic, droning textures on the cross-strings of an added bridge. Some have suggested similarities to the works of John Fahey or Sandy Bull, but Metzgers modus operandi doesnt constitute a mirroring of those styles; rather, he composes and operates apart from their music, in an insular and altogether separate universe. In the process, Metzger transcends and expands the lexicon in a wholly organic manner. -Neros Neptune.