Description
Even though solo albums tend to be self-portraits, this one’s different: it’s as if Manuel Troller has created a self-portrait, only to abandon the idea. The record’s six Vanishing Points are places of refuge he withdraws to. His music engages with the audience as if it were an open artefact, giving you the powerful sense of being able to move freely within it – of being able to engage with yourself, rather than with the ego of an artist.
For years, Manuel Troller shied away from performing solo. But three years ago, the Bee-Flat jazz club in Bern asked him to play a gig with Marc Ribot. The young, up-and-coming Swiss musician was to play first, followed by the American grandmaster of free improvisation on the electric guitar – clearly an opportunity just too good to pass up. Since then he not only plays with and composes for Schnellertollermeier, his “main” band, but also performs solo. And now he’s releasing Vanishing Points, his first solo album, recorded using only one guitar, live, with no overdubs. It features six abstract yet sharply designed compositions bristling with minimalist, shifting tessellations without relying on obvious dramatic flourishes. There’s no rock dynamism, no catharsis
