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LP
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BW 027LP
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Maurizio Abate on The Maadi Sessions: "I visited Egypt for the first time in October 2016, spending a week there, and I went back for a longer period the next February. Both times I stayed at Sara and Alberto's place, a couple of friends who have been living in the Maadi district of Cairo for about a year. The first impact with the city and its inhabitants was definitely strong: I had trouble in defining the energy which pervades the streets 24 hours a day and the feeling of perpetual movement one gets from it. Although this vortex was fascinating, it sometimes originated some kind of alienation and estrangement on my behalf. I had to distance myself from the excess of stimuli. During my first visit, I was especially struck by the sounds, so I recorded some of them over my following stay, and I tried to mix them with my electric guitar, a sort of conversation between the inner world and the outside one. During the sessions in Alberto's house, I also experimented new techniques and effects on the guitar, approaching the instrument in a broader sense. The sessions originated the pieces on this record, which also feature a collaboration with Alberto Boccardi on one track, named after his house and headquarters of Canale Undici."
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LP
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BS 043LP
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With Standing Waters Maurizio Abate recovers the discourse started with Loneliness Desire And Revenge (BS 027LP, 2016) but with a different narrative sensitivity. The symbolic air that you breathe suggests a personal and universal experience in which thoughts and perceptions remain as enveloped in an eternal cosmic wheel. It's a condition that flows sincerely into an emphatic introspection and identification between the stasis of an inner soul and the flowing vitality of stagnant aquatic landscapes. In this direction the music of Abate always condenses multiple ranges of different emotional spectra evoked by profound naturalistic references. The airy openings of the strings, the distant whispers of the harmonica, cascades of phrasings calmer or more torrential can lead into the magnificent climax of nostalgia. The string arrangement for violin and cello by Lucia Gasti introduces in a dimension of idyll, in elegiac passages of touching poetry almost of chamber music but at the same time wet by the pastoral and bucolic moods of autumn landscapes; they are paintings imbued with different flavors and colors that recall the light and the candor of the Venetian tones or the moving paintings full of meaning. In the darkest and saddest moments, the open chords are like suspensions of unresolved questions and torments, but the cathartic finale with a free and minimalist piano prelude to possible future glares, almost alludes to the idea that even where there's stasis the sun can still shine the hope for the new on the clearing of the pond. There remains the feeling with that stylistic "freedom of expression", dear to the visionaries Fahey and Basho, but there is also a clear interpretation of the expressive possibility of the lead guitar, absolutely lyrical and contemporary for refinement of the crystalline sound, which places this work in parallel with the basic acoustic tests of others great like Jim O'Rourke, Jack Rose, or James Blackshaw.
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12"
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HOL 087LP
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Another wonderful live session by the multi-instrumentalist Maurizio Abate, captured by Ulrich Rois (Bird People) in 2014 during his exhibition at the old location of the art association eLaSTiCo -- in the center of Bologna -- then mixed and edited by Maurizio himself. To be considered a twin release of the Live From The Border EP published in 2012, this single-sided release features a twenty-minute track that builds a ritual and meditative soundscape with the processed sound of a hurdy-gurdy and a harmonica. Edition of 150.
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LP
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BS 027LP
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This acoustic guitar album is a big change for experimental musician Maurizio Abate. After many years of psychedelic albums combining improvisation with a creative recording process, he composed Loneliness, Desire and Revenge based on a more traditional method -- solo acoustic guitar. In the winter of 2014 he organized a series of Italian screenings of James Cullingham's 2013 documentary In Search of Blind Joe Death: The Saga of John Fahey, giving occasional solo guitar performances before screenings, and that occasion encouraged him to experience the guitar solo language. After playing these compositions at live shows, Maurizio decided to record the tracks in an almost definitive way, though the live interpretation of the songs is always mutating. He recorded alone in his house between Christmas 2014 and New Year's Day 2015 on a reel-to-reel tape recorder, performing acoustic guitar and, in a couple of songs, electric guitar and harmonica. Loneliness, Desire and Revenge is an intimate and confidential album, evoking the musician's moods and emotions, and a document of Abate's transition from improvisational electric sound to instrumental songwriting for acoustic fingerstyle guitar. Maurizio Abate is a self-taught guitarist active since the early 2000s with an instinctive approach to experimentation. Always looking for new forms of expression, he is committed to shaping the blues, folk, and psychedelic tradition in a personal and unique way. Driven by a strong fascination for stringed instruments, he has been involved in many recording sessions since 2006, releasing several LPs under his name or with other groups, and he has toured extensively in Italy and across Europe. Abate started performing live in 2006, playing electric guitar in styles ranging from free-from to noise and ambient. After various collaborations with improv-psychedelic ensembles (Eternal Zio, Neokarma Jooklo, Golden Cup, Rella the Woodcutter, BeMyDelay), he has developed a live performance based on a processed hurdy-gurdy, harmonica, and electronics through which he creates meditative, ritual desert soundscapes. Collaborations since then include the 2016 album Superficie with Alberto Boccardi and the 2015 album La pelle del fantasma with Giovanni Donadini (Canedicoda, Ottaven) as Arbre du Ténéré (HOL 084LP).
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