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The Compass

by Álvaro Domene

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  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    In gatefold format featuring stunning artwork and design by The Braves Church.

    Includes unlimited streaming of The Compass via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days

      $12.99 USD or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $8 USD  or more

     

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Temor V 04:48
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Planck Epoch 06:26
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Mudskipper 05:40
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The Compass 04:11
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Pendulum 04:27
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about

“Total facemelt music. Just what I needed today.“ – Nate Chinen (New York Times)

“Domene sounds like a frightful demolition team.” – Paul Acquaro (The Free Jazz Collective)

“Ambient clean tones morph into Wagnerian waves of distortion, as he employs the entire range of his 7-string guitar. Álvaro Domene has mastered the art of turning non-pitched abrasive sounds into a kind of beauty.” – Michael Ross (Guitar Moderne).

“I thoroughly enjoyed The Compass. Álvaro did an excellent job summoning the darkness… I appreciate the variety of textures and harmonies, and the great recorded sound. I’ll definitely be listening to this more in the coming days.” – Ben Monder



Iluso Records presents ‘The Compass’, the debut solo guitar album by Madrid-born, New York-based guitarist and composer Álvaro Domene.

Domene relocated to New York from Madrid in 2015 and has been steadily making a name for himself in the city’s fertile creative music scene. His exceptional command of the instrument, vigorous sound and creativity have seen him collaborate with some of the leading names in avant-garde jazz and improvised music, including Joe McPhee, Karl Berger, Elliott Sharp, Henry Kaiser, Jim Black, Briggan Krauss, Michaël Attias, Ches Smith, Scott Amendola, Michael Bisio, Mike Pride, and Fred Lonberg-Holm, among others. 

With its nebulous barricades of visceral tension and epic soundscapes, ‘The Compass’ exhibits virtuosic expertise of both conventional guitar performance and the incorporation of live electronics and extended technique, generating a sonic cathedral of ear-splitting proportions.

Textures, feedback, walls of sound, polyrhythmic inventiveness, glitch and real time sampling are some of the key elements that form the fabric of this stunning recording in which the boundaries between metal, contemporary classical and jazz musics are not only blurred but ingeniously manipulated beyond recognition.

The 10 pieces on the album traverse a wide range of sound, style and sonic permutation. From the elegant and more classically aligned “solo guitar” pieces like “Pendulum” to the distorted bone-crushing eminence of the title track, ‘The Compass’ reveals Domene’s creative and compositional approach to be equally inspired by classical composers Anton Webern, Scelsi, and György Ligeti, as contemporary forward-thinking metal acts Gorguts and Meshuggah.

Performed on an electric seven-string guitar and stunningly recorded without overdubs, mixed and mastered by the legendary Colin Marston at Menegroth, The Thousand Caves in Queens, the album is a commanding statement of creative solo guitar music and a phenomenal solo debut release by the young Domene.

‘The Compass’ is essential listening for all plugged-in creative music fans and reveals what a steady diet of metal, jazz and contemporary classical music can do to a Spanish guitarist living in post-fact USA. Who says anger can't be a constructive emotion?

credits

released June 18, 2018

Álvaro Domene: seven string electric guitar and electronics.
All tracks composed by Álvaro Domene. Dometone Music BMI 2018
Performed and recorded live, without overdubs, on 1 March 2018 at Menegroth, The Thousand Caves, New York.
Recorded, mixed, and mastered by Colin Marston.
Artwork by Juan Soler at The Braves Church.

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Iluso Records Australia

Independent record label est. 2013 releasing creative new music

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