Description
Label Review.
2017 album from Police guitarist.
Our Overview.
Andy Summers rose to fame in the early 1980’s as the guitarist of the multi-million record sellingrock band - The Police. The Police were the number one band of the time and dominated the music scene and the media in the 80s with several number one records. Summers’ innovative guitar playing created a new paradigm for guitarists in this period and has been widely imitated ever since.
Prior to the Police, Summers played with various bands in the London scene, including The Animals,Soft Machine, Kevin Coyne and Kevin Ayers. After the band’s dramatic exit from the music scene, Summers continued to develop his interest in photography as well touring, recording as a solo artist,composing for films (including 2010, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, The Wild Life and Weekend atBernie's), writing books, and exhibiting his photography. Over the years, Summers has collaborated with many fellow musicians as well as a number of fellowguitarists, including Robert Fripp, John Etheridge, Victor Biglione, Benjamin Verdery, Roberto Menescal , Fernanda Takai and Rodrigo Santos.
Triboluminescence is the follow up recording by Andy Summers to his 2016 release Metal Dog. In this latest release, Summers once again delves into the deep exotic textures which characterised Metal Dog saying that part of his quest is always to find fresh if not alien sounds that avoid all the standard electric guitar clichés. “We are now living in a world of a billion guitarists “he says “so the struggle to swim upstream, sound different and make original music has become more difficult, but then maybe that is a good challenge. I play for an audience of one – yours truly. Maybe it’s the music of narcissism-although that’s not how I think of it- but I have to end up with something that I like outside of commercial concerns - but if you in the game these days you face a barrage of likes and dislikes. Everyone is a critic now…”
But if Summers takes a position on his music he proves it with the disparate exotic threads andlyricism heard on the tracks of Triboluminescence - generated from non-standard tunings –hammered guitars in tandem, looping , baritone guitar , terz guitar percussion and fretless bass andcello. Summers plays all instruments on the album apart from cello by Artyom Manukian.