Tag: Instrumental
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Hermanos Gutiérrez ‘Hijos Del Sol’ (2020)
Listening to Hermanos Gutiérrez is a semi-religious experience. They craft minimal instrumental guitar music that shimmers with a dreamlike, hallucinogenic energy that immediately transports you to a different world. In songwriting we talk about world-building all the time, and that process with traditional music (aka pop) usually needs lyrics to fully get the point home.…
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Frank Zappa ‘Hot Rats’ (1969)
Frank Zappa was a groundbreaking composer, guitarist, and bandleader whose career spanned a metric ton of musical genres while he was active from the late 60’s to early 90’s. Drawing on influences from doo-wop to avant-garde classical music, he fused rock, jazz, and complex modern music with a satirical twist that often mocked popular culture…
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J Dilla ‘Donuts’ (2006)
It was the winter of 2006 and iconic beatmaster J Dilla was in and out of the hospital. With his previous chart-topping performances with artists like Common, The Roots, Mos Def, Janet Jackson, and Busta Rhymes in the rearview mirror, and his health quickly deteriorating due to a rare terminal blood illness, Dilla got to…
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Spyro Gyra ‘Morning Dance’ (1979)
American jazz fusion can run the gamut from being overtly cheesy to incredibly interesting, and Spyro Gyra’s 1979 album Morning Dance checks both of those boxes (sometimes in the same song). Blending elements of R&B, jazz, and funk along with virtuostic performances from as many as 10 musicians on an individual song, the band zips…
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Ratatat ‘Ratatat’ (2004)
In the genre of guitar electronica (which is pretty damn niche), Ratatat ruled supreme during my high school and early college days. These guys were the epitome of Brooklyn hipsters before it was fashionable to be a Brooklyn hipster, recording their neo-psychedelic electronic rock album in their bassist’s Crown Heights apartment during the resurgence of…
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Godspeed You! Black Emperor ‘Lift Your Skinny Fists’ (2000)
Godspeed You! Black Emperor has built a pretty hardcore cult following over the past two decades for their blissfully meandering chamber rock. We’ve discussed previously how some music is felt not necessarily heard (see Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago for a sterling example) and Lift Your Skinny Fists To The Sky Like Antennas to…
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Dexter Britain ‘Royalty’ (2023)
I first discovered Dexter Britain 10 years ago on Soundcloud when I heard his 2012 release Music To Sell Cars By. I was immediately taken by the richness of his sound and the heart each of his arrangements had, each one teeming with life and dramatic flair. At that point I signed up for his…
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Terje Rypdal & The Chasers ‘Blue’ (1987)
Known affectionately as “the tone poet of the Fender Stratocaster”, Norwegian guitarist Terje Rypdal has had a prolific 50-year career that has blended jazz, rock, and classical music into his own unique take on what music can be. His 1987 album Blue is a fusionist’s dream, filled with eclectic sounds that bend and warp over…
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Pretty Lights ‘A Color Map of the Sun’ (2013)
Pretty Lights flipped the script on EDM in a relatively big way during recording sessions for A Color Map of the Sun. Whereas his prior album releases all were based off digital samples of others original work, he entered the studio in 2013 with the intention to compose an album filled with 100% original material.…
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Joe Satriani ‘Surfing With The Alien’ (1987)
There’s not many guitarists that can absolutely rip like Joe Satriani and 1987’s Surfing With The Alien is a love letter to all the guitar-heads out there who just want to hear some good ol’ fashioned shredding for the sake of it. It’s bombastic, over the top, and just plain fun as hell. The album…
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Wolfhand ‘The Devil Arrives’ (2020)
A lone figure in a wide brimmed black hat appears just over the skyline. His long and dark leather jacket blows in the breeze, flowing with the dusty desert wind and yet unperturbed by it, a man who transcends . The silver glint of his revolvers, one-a-side dutifully attached to his hip as they have…
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Animals As Leaders ‘Parrhesia’ (2022)
Prog metal is having its moment in the Plank household the past few weeks, with excellent albums like Colors by Between The Buried and Me and Remember That You Will Die by Polyphia being a handful of favorites. Today we take a trip to the harder side of instrumental metal with the raucous Parrhesia by…
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Devin Morrison ‘Dream Lobby Vol. IV’ (2022)
Dream Lobby Vol. IV is an album well-suited for hold music around something exciting (think less customer tech support, more booking a travel agency) or elevator music in the lobby at a Las Vegas casino. I’ve actually started leveraging Devin Morrison’s albums as a soundtrack for work when I’m building Powerpoint decks for an upcoming…
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Polyphia ‘Remember That You Will Die’ (2022)
Polyphia is one of the (if not the) most popular instrumental prog-rock bands operating today and their 2022 album Remember That You Will Die underscores just why– it’s filled with hooks aplenty and simply virtuosic instrumental performances. Guitarists Tim Henson and Scott LePage absolutely shred throughout the entirety of this 39-minute affair, taking their metal…
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