This 1987 production signifies experimental guitarist David Torn's second effort for Germany-based ECM Records. Here, the artist exhibits a sound, style, and methodology that are clearly his own, amid superb support by Bill Bruford (drums), Tony Levin (Chapman Stick/bass), and Mark Isham (trumpets). Torn generates gobs of excitement via his cunningly articulated phraseology, while also incorporating North African and East Indian modal concepts into these power-packed performances, fabricated upon climactic opuses and steamy crescendos.

David Torn is a hardcore looper. He's been creating loops in his music since well before most people ever heard of the term (20+ years). Not only does he do it on studio recordings, he does it in live situations, looping not just himself but other bandmembers! Given that, it's a bit surprising that Only Sky is his first truly solo recording: just Torn, guitar, and loops (plus a bit of oud on one track). Although there's a hovering ambience to all these pieces, this isn't new agey ambience: the pieces are sometimes ominous or uneasy with Torn producing guitar-like tones and very un-guitar-like tones and sometimes manipulating the loops in a not-so-subtle way. He alternates between song-oriented pieces like "Spoke with Folks," which approaches Frisell-y Americana, and more abstract ones like "Was a Cave, There…," with sounds like balloon squeals and ray guns giving way to some serious loop manipulation…

Guitarist-composer David Torn, a longstanding ECM artist, has enjoyed a particularly fruitful 21st-century with the label, releasing two albums under his own name – the solo only sky and quartet disc prezens – in addition to producing records by Tim Berne and Michael Formanek. With Sun of Goldfinger, Torn returns in a trio alongside the alto saxophonist Berne and percussionist Ches Smith (a member of Berne’s Snakeoil band who made his ECM leader debut in 2016 with The Bell). The Torn/Berne/Smith trio, also dubbed Sun of Goldfinger, features alone on two of this album’s three intense tracks of 20-plus minutes; the vast sonic tapestries of “Eye Muddle” and “Soften the Blow” – each spontaneous group compositions – belie the fact that only a trio is weaving them, with live electronics by Torn and Smith expanding the aural envelope.

Tranceportation Volume 2 is the next destination in Sonar’s ongoing musical journey as the Swiss-based band celebrates 10 years of cutting-edge music-making.

Tranceportation Volume 2 is the next destination in Sonar’s ongoing musical journey as the Swiss-based band celebrates 10 years of cutting-edge music-making. Once again the quartet formed in 2010 have joined forces with internationally-respected experimental guitarist, David Torn, to deliver an album brimming with a sound that's marked by bold, resonant creativity. The group’s polyrhythmic approach, utilising various elements of tension, release, space and dynamics rewrites the rules about what guitar-dominated music is capable of achieving. Sonar’s founder, guitarist Stephan Thelen, whose work has been performed by the Kronos Quartet, brings forward a further instalment of compositions that seamlessly blend a pointillistic, metrical complexity with deep subterranean grooves that engage both the heart and the mind of the listener…

"Had MC Escher made music instead of drawing impossible and perplexing perspectives, it would sound like Sonar" is how writer Sid Smith once assessed the Swiss-based band’s work. It remains an apt description for the outfit’s method of creating hypnotic pieces by gradually building intricate patterns of picked notes, plucked harmonics, mesmeric bass, and insistent rhythms. The music created by Stephan Thelen (tritone guitar), Bernard Wagner (tritone guitar), Christian Kuntner (tritone bass), Manuel Pasquinelli (drums, percussion) harnesses elements of rock, jazz and contemporary classical minimalism and fuses them to create a distinctive musical language…

Sonar's fourth release Vortex reflects the sound of surprise. After three uncompromising quartet albums exploring the edges of minimalist groove, the Swiss group has partnered with renowned guitarist, composer and producer David Torn for its RareNoise debut.
The band, comprised of guitarists Stephan Thelen and Bernhard Wagner, bassist Christian Kuntner and drummer Manuel Pasquinelli have long been celebrated for combining the visceral power and dynamics of art rock with a minimalist aesthetic…