E
lijah McLaughlin’s two albums to date have marked him out as a fingerpicker of remarkable talents. But as the Chicago guitarist points out, “A lot of my music doesn’t really fit squarely into the American Primitive mould.” Influenced by Indian Carnatic music, Steve Reich and late-period Talk Talk, his latest album III finds McLaughlin expanding from his core ensemble – long-term collaborators James Toth and Joel Styzens – to experiment with new players and new technologies. “Around these sessions, I was deep into experimenting with modal textures,” he explains. “I’d
and cello drones
created a tape-loop delay with two old reel-to-reels, and I would run a Juno-6 synth through the machines. I would create these ambient drones, then compose guitar music while dialling into the overtones within these modal textures.” Several tracks, meanwhile, feature the Chicago-based Dutch cellist Katinka Kleijn. “For the session with Katinka, I prepared a bunch of material in an open C tuning and kept my chops up. She’s an incredible improviser and a virtuoso, so I wanted to be as ready as I could be in preparation for the session, and then just be open to how the music unfolds.”