Joseba Irazoki - Gitarra Onomatopeikoa II

Basque-speaking Spanish guitarist Joseba Irazoki debuts for Hegoa with a second volume in his Gitarra Onomatopeikoa series. I'd suggest that you don't need to be fluent in Basque to make sense of Irazoki's chosen title for these works, and you can also clearly see why he's decided to run with it a second time, so effective is it at detailing the highly nuanced and expressive playing on show. Broadly speaking, we're situated in overlapping terrain of Loren Connors, Jon Collin and Keiji Haino, a combination of Primitive-style finger work, elegant pastoral beauty and alien dissonance. Rhodri Davies and Raphael Roginski might also make appearances, which tells you a little bit about the overall context for the music Irazoki makes, but this still feels like a distinctly solo pursuit, a document of a player fully locked-in and confident of their own voice. Both noiseniks and those more attuned to the folk tradition will find much to savour here.