Alan Licht - Havens 2LP

Alan Licht returns to VDSQ with Havens, a sprawling double-disc set of exploratory guitar-based compositions forged from the myriad possibilities arising when strings collide with electricity and space. Licht is masterful and relentless in his negotiation of the often-unknowable intersections that exist between juxtaposing strands of sound. His work is marked by contrast and contradiction: maximalism versus minimalism; rockist inclinations versus avant, expanded-field expression; loose improvisation versus considered performance. What these dichotomies shouldn't obscure, however, is the simple pleasure that transpires in his refracting of idiom, conjuring expansive pieces that collapse, stratify and convolve competing schools of music to wholly singular ends. 2LP housed in full color gatefold jacket with printed inner sleeves.

"Havens documents a new sound for Licht, building on a previous VDSQ release Currents, his last major solo outing from 2015. Playing those solo acoustic tracks live on tour, their lyricism translated through the power of a PA, Licht was taken by the overtones surging atop those song-like pieces, transforming them into something new. The compositions here, particularly the mesmeric title track, luxuriate in that newfound sense of possibility, infused with a rock-born urgency by way of lightning-fast, urgent strumming gradually unfurling layers of phantom harmonics. The record is rich with considered, contained explosivity, firmly minimalist in its patient pace and ear for hallucination but expressed in defiantly, deliciously rock terms, each piece its own lyrical hybrid built of scant elements unfurled with painterly grace. This loving dislocation and reframing of the rock lexicon remains true to the Licht M.O., Havens being a resoundingly deep listen teeming with visceral energy, a glorious love letter to the still-unexplored potentialities of a simple guitar thrust into the hands of an individual who simultaneously reveres its known nooks but steadfastly continues to push it into crannies uncharted." --Edward Beaver, Nature's Trip Records