music Home > Record Reviews

The last few years have been particularly eventful for legendary guitarist/free improvisor Derek Bailey: he moved to Barcelona after decades in England, turned 75, and contracted carpal tunnel syndrome in his right hand. “When I consult medical people about this, they all say I should have an operation,” Bailey says during Carpal Tunnel’s opening track, “Explanation and Thanks.” “But I’m more interested in trying to find a way around it.” Playing without a pick for the first time in ages, Bailey devises a thumb-heavy method with familiar results: detuned plucks, abrupt stops, truncated strums, and an unwavering ability to avoid predictable patterns.

What sets Carpal Tunnel apart is less tangible. While Bailey’s basic tools remain intact, his approach is understandably muted. Whether it’s out of concern for aggravating his injury or a continuation of the subtle patience he displayed on 2003’s Ballads, something has Bailey in a hesitant mood. Carpal Tunnel’s ability to avoid rashness while remaining spontaneous is intoxicating.

The tracks were recorded in two-week intervals. “After 3 Weeks” is timid and deliberate, with dislocated plucks strung together the way stars seem to intentionally form constellations. “After 7 Weeks” explores reverberation, with Bailey more interested in echo than initial burst, and the album’s high point, “After 9 Weeks,” gently pokes at the gaps between lone notes and clustered strums. By the end of Carpal Tunnel, Bailey’s physical limitation, like many of the challenges he has given himself, has somehow freed his music even further.

The challenge Minnesota musician Paul Metzger has created is more voluntary than Bailey’s, but no less intriguing. Metzger modified his banjo by adding 12 strings and a sitar bridge. His Three Improvisations boldly attacks that complex instrument, producing an array of sounds—Indian-influenced drones, Ennio Morricone-flavored riffs—not normally associated with the banjo. While Metzger’s twists and turns evoke Bailey, his playing deconstructs tradition from the inside out, closer to the classical-infused abstractions of John Fahey and the mystic string bending of Sir Richard Bishop.

Metzger’s 23-minute opening track begins with distant, flutelike sounds that evoke a Buddhist temple rising to meet the morning sun. Soon after, he establishes a line of forceful plucks that get massaged, inverted, destroyed, and rebuilt. Mixing the rapid-fire picking of Django Reinhardt with the reverent raga of Robbie Basho, Metzger lets his own pulse dictate his music’s rushes and retreats. The middle track is almost a ballad, carving a winding river through a deep, dark forest. Three Improvisations ends with Metzger’s most ambitious piece—26 minutes of thoughtful strums and aggressive chords that suggests the amazing sounds here are just a fraction of the noises filling Metzger’s mind.