Browse by Artist: BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN

Artist:	BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN
Title:	Inside
Label:	STRANGE ATTRACTORS AUDIO HOUSE
Format:	CD
Price:	$12.00
Catalog #:	SAAH 002CD

The 2nd US release from this former East German guitarist, his most radically inventive work, full of propulsive rhythmic minimalism -- a new plateau in solo guitar audio. "Evolving amorphously from the New Folk tradition inspired by Takoma Records artists John Fahey, Peter Lang and especially Robbie Basho, Berlin's most enigmatic steel-string guitarist Steffen Basho-Junghans exorcises radically new voices and perspectives out of the acoustic steel string guitar. Possessing an impeccable instinct and insatiable curiosity, this innovative guitar master is on a constant search to discover new possibilities for the instrument. Conceptually, Inside is a metaphysical excursion exploring the idea 'inside the outside'. Using 'wrong' playing techniques as the basic launching point, Inside casts aside the inhibitive shackles of theory and develops the basic idea via a meditative and utterly minimalist approach. Hypnotizing soundscapes emerge from the depths, enveloping and distorting any semblance of time to the point of blissful disorientation. Broken into three movements, '1st Movement' establishes the very essence of the piece as a subtly shifting meander through space, building in a somewhat percussive, raga-like manner. '2nd Movement, Part 1, 2 & 3' seem to hit a sojourn in the trip, dancing around a universe where Derek Bailey and Rod Poole incessantly debate the merits of John Fahey's America album. '3rd Movement' moves back into the saturating theme, galloping through various minute manifestations, ebbing and flowing effortlessly. An astonishing array of sounds are coaxed out of his acoustic steel string, remarkable considering Inside was recorded solo, with no overdubs whatsoever. Standing uniquely apart as a singular suite of minimal-trance for solo acoustic guitar, Inside sets folk standards collectively on it's ear. With this record, Steffen Basho-Junghans makes a radical statement on the potential of acoustic guitar music. His ultimate achievement, however, is the creation of absolute beauty."

Artist:	BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN
Title:	Waters In Azure
Label:	STRANGE ATTRACTORS AUDIO HOUSE
Format:	CD
Price:	$13.00
Catalog #:	SAAH 005CD

"Waters In Azure is an album of sound sculptures, coursing through themes of structure, space and state. Inaugurating the album is 'Waters', a winding, amorphous meditation upon waters' various characteristics. Broken into three distinct parts, the composition coaxes blissfully disorientating shrapnel from the guitar, slithering under Steffen's alien 12-string slide techniques. 'Waters' dances drunkenly like a burbling creek, building, cresting, then breaking into a spacious trickle, only to swell again as it spills forth across some eerie landscape. Harkening back to Inside a raga-pulse is 'Inside the Rain', the absolute centerpiece of the album. Shimmering fractals glisten with fantastic beauty, expanding determinedly towards an ecstatic plateau, propelled by the rhythmic, vibrant sparkle of SBJ's 12-string. Experimenting with technique, form, and sound by merging minimalist composition, Eastern raga and the acoustic steel string/folk tradition pioneered by Robbie Basho, John Fahey and Sandy Bull, Steffen Basho-Junghans has transcended any easy genre pigeonholing to sit perched high atop a musical plane entirely of his own creation. Water Is Azure is his latest volley at the gods and goddesses of sound, pelting them mercilessly with his elaborately foreign, yet utterly beautiful brand of minimalist solo guitar."

Artist:	BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN
Title:	Rivers and Bridges
Label:	STRANGE ATTRACTORS AUDIO HOUSE
Format:	CD
Price:	$13.00
Catalog #:	SAAH 010CD

"Rivers and Bridges is a pastoral experience, rich in color and texture, coursing through various moods with river allegory at its' core. Impressionist six-string dramaturgy cascade forth, ebbing and flowing in steady rage-like waves, across placid sound pools and frothing rapids. Through each piece a myriad of sounds styles are explored, touching upon American folk, Native American linearity. Middle Eastern resonance, East Indian raga, and Western classical with heartfelt ease -- and often within the same tune. Propelled all the while by an intricate sense of melodic invention, the depth of imagery and complexity of texture is remarkable and simply gorgeous. Reminiscent of his Songs of The Earth and the timeless Takoma Records sound, Rivers and Bridges is an instant classic acoustic guitar record, sounding familiar and yet imbued with subtleties unlike anything else you've heard before."

Artist:	BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN
Title:	7 Books
Label:	STRANGE ATTRACTORS AUDIO HOUSE
Format:	2CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	SAAH 020/21CD

"With over two hours of music spread across two discs, 7 Books finds Basho-Junghans stretching way out, mutating the steel string tradition into the most elaborate excursion into sound and composition that has ever fluttered from his fingertips. Basho-Junghans' experimental works are microcosms of his chance discoveries with the acoustic steel string guitar, focusing in on a particular aspect of his epiphanies; 7 Books gathers all of these microcosms into one Big Bang, erupting into a vast universe of subtle and complex sound galaxies. Six-string guitar provides the template for Disc One, and each 'book' (composition) opens and closes with a deep array of chapters and passages. Chiming tones, pulsating percussive runs, finger scrapes and dazzling finger techniques build and build in raga-like fashion. Disc Two focuses on music composed with slide guitar, and Basho-Junghans' particular alien glissandos dance like refracted light, a gloriously disorienting sound broadcast seemingly from a foreign land. Minimalism, Eastern raga, trance-inducing repetition, Spectralist tonal investigations, folk and American fingerstyle steel-string tradition coalesce into one astounding epic for the solo acoustic guitar. Steffen Basho-Junghans follows his instincts above everything else and discovers a myriad of universes within a solitary instrument, inventing a new language in the process."

Artist:	BASHO-JUNGHANS, STEFFEN
Title:	Late Summer Morning
Label:	STRANGE ATTRACTORS AUDIO HOUSE
Format:	CD
Price:	$13.00
Catalog #:	SAAH 045CD

"Much in the vein of his pastorale epic Rivers and Bridges, Steffen Basho-Junghans harkens back to the heyday of American Primitive guitar, as defined by John Fahey circa Fare Forward Voyagers and America, and the American raga structures of Robbie Basho. 'Late Summer Morning,' the title track, is an unabashedly beautiful extended composition for 6-string guitar, stretching out languidly and effortlessly like a morning raga saturated in crisp, warming hues. With the steel string tradition as a steadfast reference point, Basho-Junghans utilizes unorthodox pacing, picking and rhythms as Late Summer Morning progresses. 'Woodland Orchestra' discreetly harkens to themes of tone and minimalism as found on 7 Books or any one of his experimental albums, while 'Azure No. 3' wraps glistening guitar lines into circular patterns to create lovely trance-inducing color wheels. A key component to Late Summer Morning, however, is Basho-Junghans' ability to strike out into the unknown while keeping the sounds and tones grounded, something that is evident as multiple sound forms hit the ear with calming bliss. American folk and classical, East Indian raga, Native American linearity, the resonance of Middle Eastern folk and melodic minimalism (i.e. Steve Reich) meld together in a fashion that is tremendously cinematic and allegorically vivid. Late Summer Morning is 'minimalist trance-folk,' a modern masterpiece of where Guitar Soli has gone, and where it can go next."

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