BASIC :: This Is BASIC

A few years back, Chris Forsyth hipped me to Robert Quine and Fred Maher’s 1984 LP Basic, an instrumental album of guitar and drum machine rock that sounds like it’s playing at the wrong speed. His new trio with baritone guitarist Nick Millevoi (whose recent Moon Pulses sounds like the record I wish U2 would make) and Mikel Patrick Avery on percussion and electronics more than winks at Basic with their debut, This is BASIC—at times its wonky, distortion saturated riffs recall that album for sure. But these guys are on their own trip.

Nick Millevoi :: Moon Pulses

Enter Nick Millevoi. The guitarist’s Moon Pulses rises over the horizon of cosmic guitar, breathing life from a new direction. The six-part suite that encompasses the LP offers a stoic take on the free-form headyness that proliferates the current world of guitar records.