- Australian multi-instrumentalist Oren Ambarchi started out as a drummer, but he's mostly known now as a singular guitarist. He's a wizard of electric desert blues full of imagery and emotion, and a first-rate improviser at that. Not only has he been releasing records for nearly two decades, his list of collaborators over the years is a staggering who's-who of experimental music. Keith Rowe, Peter Rehberg, Otomo Yoshihide, Keiji Haino, Stephen O'Malley and Thomas Brinkmann are just a few of the artists he's worked with. On Hubris, his cast of co-conspirators is more electronic than ever, with Mark Fell, Ricardo Villalobos and Keith Fullerton Whitman joining avant-garde staples like Jim O'Rourke and Arto Lindsay.
Hubris consists of two long pieces, "Hubris, Pt. 1" and "Hubris, Pt. 3," that flank a two-minute interlude, the palette cleansing "Hubris, Pt. 2." The first and last tracks employ the Steve Reich method of stasis via perpetual motion. "1," especially, seems to float in the hypnotic rhythm generated by layers of muted guitar and ringing harmonics. "3" uses the same rhythmic guitar layers as a starting point for fervent instrumental wilding—first from drummers Joe Talia and Will Guthrie and modular synth master Whitman, then from Lindsay and Ambarchi himself on guitar. "2" is an oddly evocative lullaby of bass guitar melodicism, with vocal fragments like a conversation overheard from another room.
It's a testament to Ambarchi's arrangement skills that each contribution dovetails beautifully with Hubris's larger idea while still feeling individual. If it wasn't explained who did what where, even the most informed listener would have difficulty picking out some of the collaborative elements—that's how well they embed within Hubris as a whole. But what makes this record feel special is how naturally it moves to occupy a space between classical minimalism, jazz, rock and electronic music. There's an admirable level of refinement to Hubris, even as it also feels brilliantly alive and ever in the moment.
Tracklist01. Hubris, Pt. 1
02. Hubris, Pt. 2
03. Hubris, Pt. 3