#insilio

The first two tracks, for instance, reference Catalonia—the first overtly in the title which is “Homenaja a Cataluῆa” and the second through the language, as “Tinc Ganes de Veure’t” means “I want to see you in Catalan.” “Homenaja” begins the disc in a ruminative space, its slow strums left to hover, its flurries of picking punctuated by homely squeaks of string. The melody, country pure and simple, emerges like a Polaroid developing, pushing up through the surface of picking and then sinking back down again. “Tinc Ganes de Veure’t” runs a bit starker and less flowery, a pendulum swing between notes repeating like the thought you can’t shake at 3 a.m.

Elsewhere, though, the sounds evoke a bucolic America. “Arquitecto Tenista” swaggers in porch country manner a la Jack Rose’s ragtime sessions, while “Cuesta Ramon,” coaxes eerie vibrating atmospheres out of slide and pick, like Rose again, but in a transcendental mode. You can hardly play acoustic blues like this without a nod to John Fahey, and here Isasa makes his homage explicit in thoughtful, evocative “Copla para John Fahey.” The cut is spare, but set against an ambient drone that captures some of the master’s blend of quotidian folk and gnostic mystery.

Throughout, Isasa pursues his ends with a meditative clarity. Every note seems surrounded by a golden glow, and there is plenty of time to consider the last one before the first intrudes again. It is the sort of record that changes depending on when and how you listen, reflecting something inside of you as well as the notes on guitar. The first few times it played for me, it seemed to reflect the stark grey winter around me. Now, I hear it again, and green pushes through the crack. It is, all in all, a very good record in its quiet way, reflecting multiple guitar traditions in a pensive, self-searching way that makes them seem intimate and personal.