about the record

Recorded at Giuseppe Ielasi’s studio in Monza outside Milan over two days in February 2022, the seven pieces on Down On Darkened Meetings continue his renewed exploration of the guitar, a thread present in much of his recent solo work. Emerging in the late 1990s as an improviser focused on prepared acoustic and electric guitars, Ielasi shifted over the next decade toward loop-based constructs, splitting into abstracted takes on club and hip-hop styles on one hand, and spectral electroacoustic explorations on the other.

Returning to the guitar in recent years, he treats it as a source of shimmering metallic glissandi (Five Wooden Frames) and elegiac, double-tracked lines reminiscent of Frisell playing Feldman (The Prospect). Here, the electric guitar is filtered, looped, and stretched into irregular echoes through a bank of pedals.

Like many of Ielasi’s releases, Down On Darkened Meetings consists of short, untitled pieces that focus single-mindedly on one instrument or source. The opening track introduces a timbral world of fizzing, filtered tones, chiming harmonics, and woozy looping bass figures. At times, these sounds are untraceable to the guitar; at others, particularly on the final pieces, the instrument is unmistakable, built from half-playing and subtle loops that evoke a hushed, private atmosphere.

These seven pieces balance abstraction and immediacy, austerity and abundance. Imbued with Ielasi’s light touch, careful pacing, and subtly psychedelic approach to stereo space, Down On Darkened Meetings stands as a major new work from a master of contemporary experimental music.