#finger-picking

[dustedmagazine]

Davide Cedolin — Ligurian Pastoral (Island House)

Ligurian Pastoral by Davide Cedolin

Liguria, in Italy, is where the boot might meet the top of the thigh, a mountainous region in which rocky cliffs jut out of the sea and tourists hike from fishing village to fishing village along the Cinque Terre. It’s not exactly unpopulated — the largest city is Genoa — but there are lots of parks and natural areas, and it is there in these wilder places that guitarist Davide Cedolin finds inspiration.

This cassette release collects seven serene and unruffled meditations, mostly in finger picked acoustic guitar, but augmented sometimes with threads of bowed bass, lap steel and harmonica. Natural sounds, like a thunderstorm and bird noises, move in and out of these pieces, which are, themselves, natural and unpretentious. You can imagine the guitarist working them out in some sunny spot, perhaps picking up stakes and running inside when the weather turns and its starts to rain.

“Ca de Cavo” is especially lovely, its eddying cascades of finger picking shot through with bending, shifting tones of lap steel (that’s Mike Horn from Seawind of Battery sitting in). These compositions are not overly concerned with melody or song structure. They unspool in repeated patterns with few signposts indicating beginning, middle or end. They open out into a kind of wide-horizoned dreaminess, an infinity pool of sound that stretches as far as you can see.

Cedolin’s Instagram tells us that he’s been learning from Daniel Bachman, another skilled finger-picker whose compositions stretch to incorporate the living world. He is, at least so far, more tethered to the sound of his instrument; field recordings nest in the crevices of his songs, rather than taking them over. In “Lische Alte,” for instance, the rumble of wind slips between pensive guitar chords, the arc of lap steel (Horn again) tracing a throughline in the lyric jangle.

Ligurian Pastoral exists in its own time and space. It’s in no hurry to get to the end of its placid compositions, nor, after a while, is the listener. But it does take some adjustment, some slowing, some calming, some willingness to sit with this music, to get to its pleasures. Put it on with the sun streaming in and the whole afternoon idling in front of you. It will unfold like a flower.

Jennifer Kelly

[hinamie]

alongside someone like you

[henreyettah]

First tlt comic pls be kind to me

Edit: made a very minuscule change. Might take a trained eye to see it (hint)

[wandaverse]

meet me in the pale moonlight…

vampire!wanda please suck me dry, i’ll worship you for eternity

[demaparbat-hp]

Toph as a Goalball player 💪💚

[ricky-mortis]

“You’re a caveman. And I’ve invented fire.”

Close-ups under the cut :)

[xxplastic-cubexx]

chair + helmet for funsies

[crustyfloor]

do I be sad or think this is so cute it looks like Ivan mimicking Till's air guitar practice 😭😭😭

[knightoflove]

You’ve started to look like your f/o.

Not physically, but you’ve picked up some of their habits. Their nervous ticks, what they do with their hands. Little mannerisms that make others go “you’ve been spending too much time around them”.

They’ve done the same, mirroring some of your actions. It’s the art of noticing, wondering why and then incorporating it into the things they do because it’s something that you do, and it’s something that reminds them of you every day.

Pro/ship dni pls

Dividers by @.saradika-graphics

[fruitfloats]

idk man ive had this thought rolling around my brain insistently the past few weeks

things passed down in the robins that have nothing to do with heroics??? like jason saw dick do something and copy it, tim copies him and it just goes down them all.

like dick always stretching his wrist out an odd way and all the robins just do that because they copied it from the robin before them??? and they dont realize it like thatd be so sweet

[dustedmagazine]

Jordan Perry—What Do You See Every Day (Feeding Tube)

Photo by Whitney Brown

What Do You See Every Day? by Jordan Perry

Jordan Perry’s latest is only 36 minutes long but widely varied and full of rewarding moments. The core voice remains the nylon-stringed acoustic guitar, but at various points it is joined by or set aside in favor of electronics, wordless vocals, birdsong, fiddle and/or melodica. The thoughtful sequencing of the tracks creates the impression of a pleasant journey through, presumably, the sights and sounds that a person might encounter every day.

Perry has developed over a series of albums a style of playing and composition that reflects the influence, direct or indirect, of modern classical and avant-garde composers as well as the Takoma school. Each of the solo guitar pieces—the first track, “Theme,” the title track, and closer “Redact”—unfolds as an often unpredictable series of single notes or clusters of notes with frequent harmonics separated by space and connected by sustain. The hypnotic combination of patterns with seeming randomness is akin to watching leaves fall or waves ripple. 

The guitar seems to engage in a dialog with birds on “Five Hours,” while in “From Traces, What Do You Do?” the electronics and wordless vocals gradually swallow it, building to an angelic blend of sound. Only one of the tunes, “Days Have Gone, By Volume” (an allusion to John Fahey’s song and album title “Days Have Gone By”), is suggestive of the Takoma school; featuring a second guitar by Ned Oldham along with an overdubbed fiddle by Perry, the track unfolds slowly and features a nice coda with wordless vocals in the last couple of minutes. 

The melodica piece, “For Three,” shows what happens when Perry applies his approach to an instrument with all-or-nothing sustain; the effect is almost medieval, kind of like the work of Ellen Arkbro or Laura Cannell, and points to an interesting way forward for his sound if he chooses to pursue it. 

What Do You See Every Day is perhaps Perry’s most accomplished and ambitious recording to date, and it stands out in an already great year for acoustic guitar-based music. 

Jim Marks

[lesbianalicent]

somewhere in the multiverse there exists a comically evil timeline where they did manage to keep the warden in dai and i want to go there for just a few minutes. just to see how spitting mad the fandom was.

[shazzbaa]

Your star has never guided you wrong.

I'm so emotionally compromised by child, you guys... I wasn't even expecting to be able to still see and pick out which one is my kid on the cavern roof, MUCH LESS how bright and special it is.... The fact that Sam can, in a weird way, spend time with his child at zee, looking up to the false-stars to guide him, rEALLY DID ME IN.......

Anyway more liveblogging and feelings under the cut,

[No hints or info about other post-ambition tie-ins in tags/replies/etc please! I like stumbling upon things myself]

so like immediately after finishing the ambition we were obviously all emotionally compromised, but also, we were already thinking about this --

WE DIDNT KNOW. SO LIKE TWO WEEKS LATER,

IM NEVER GOING TO BE OVER THIS

And then I had to deal with these feelings by drawing this picture. ANYWAY THANKS FALLEN LONDON FOR MAKING THIS THE PERFECT AMBITION FOR SAMUEL IN EVERY WAY.

[reggiestein]

Thank GOD death note didnt come out in 2024 matsuda wouldve had tiktok and been annoying about it

[mikimeiko]

We Are Lady Parts | Season 2 (2024), Nida Manzoor

[bones-of-a-rabbit]

pov ur bestie saw that ur hand was within Grabbing Range and LUNGED at that opportunity (breaking u out of ur Bad Thoughts Spiral and grounding u with how silly he is)