Bill Frisell: Ghost Town

Virtuouso guitarist Bill Frisell has played all sorts of music in all sorts of bands over his nearly 30-year career, from no-wave to country to big band jazz. On Ghost Town—a collection of covers, new material, and reworkings—he completes his one-man musical cycle by dispensing with sidemen altogether. Instead, using multi-layered guitars, a few samples, and his banjo, Frisell collaborates with himself.

Thankfully, it's clear early on that completeness was not Frisell's only motivation for making Ghost Town. The album is a meditation on loneliness, and the absence of sidemen is essential to its vacant mood. It's full of hauntingly melancholy tunes that evoke a stroll through a dilapidated Western town, making Ghost Town one of the most aptly titled albums in recent memory. Even the jubilant "Poem for Eva" is reduced to somber tenderness.

Aside from the downcast mood, Ghost Town holds few surprises for the seasoned Frisell fan. Like much of his recent work, the record presents a history of American music made modern, with works by Hank Williams, George Gershwin, and John McLaughlin refashioned in Frisell's image. And as usual, he says more with one note than most other musicians do with 10.

Frisell's characteristic strangeness and screaming guitar both make their return after a notable absence from last year's Good Dog, Happy Man. However, Frisell breaks no new ground in either department, unless you count his use of a Fender Jaguar rather than the usual Klein for his sublime solo on "Variations on a Theme (Tales From the Farside)." Although Ghost Town isn't the best introduction to Frisell's work (that distinction goes to Gone, Just Like a Train), it is an essential record for those interested in the guitarist, and a good buy for anyone interested in improvised music. (Nonesuch)

—Stevan Nicholas

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