David Grubbs
A Guess At The Riddle

If names like Squirrel Bait, Bastro, and Gastr Del Sol mean something to you, start reading this review from the next paragraph; if instead, they seem like tongue twisters or Polish midfielders from 1978-'80, you can continue reading these lines from the start. Those names correspond to some of the most innovative realities of American experimental rock in recent decades and, as a common denominator, share the figure of David Grubbs.

David Grubbs is a guitarist, pianist, and composer, as well as one of the key figures in current American singer-songwriter minimalism. He has been collaborating for years with Jim O'Rourke, Tony Conrad, Thurston Moore, Matmos, Sonic Youth, and John McEntire.
Gastr Del Sol released one of the most important works for the growth of new American music of the '90s, titled "Upgrade and Afterlife," alternating brilliant ideas with an introspective environmental avant-garde that made them a reference icon in less well-known music genres.

David Grubbs decides to "go solo" and starts a productive solo career, releasing interesting works ("Banana Cabbage," "Potato Lettuce," "Onion Orange," and "The Thicket") and others less convincing ("Rickets & Scurvy"), consistently maintaining that subtle profile between folk, introspective singer-songwriter style and avant noise music close to the droning experimentalism of Tony Conrad. Grubbs' records are in fact almost always difficult to label, between a Fahey-like fingerpicking, but also with pop scents and minimal avant-garde.

The solo album "A Guess At The Riddle" alternates moments in line with earlier productions with more conventional others; just consider the opening track "Knight Errant", a song that could very well appear in works by Smashing Pumpkins, REM, or other more markedly pop-rock artists (listen to believe).
It is the most pop and catchy track of David Grubbs' entire career, maintaining a sunny matrix that will never be found in the artist's songs again, except perhaps in the following "A Cold Apple."
These two songs alone as the beginning of an album (actually among the most accessible of our artist) are enough to disregard listening to the other tracks for many old fans, but also a portion of the most pretentious critics who stop at a golden past represented by "The Thicket" or even Gastr Del Sol.
"The Neophyte", instead, with its guitar flashes, brings back to mind the early period and serves as a sort of preview to the album's central part, which recovers Grubbs' recent past sounds. To turn words into music, listen to the guitar drones expelled from his computer in "Rosie Ruiz" or the songs for piano and voice "You'll Never Tame Me" and "Your Neck In The Woods", among the album's sound peaks enriched by some Matmos preciousness. There is also a cover of Red Crayola, "Magnificence As Such", reinterpreted without excessive digressions.

As in the album "Rickets & Scurvy", not coincidentally in both works Rick Moody will be by his side, Grubbs remains more focused on singing, which he showcases in a more relaxed tone than usual and rarely tinges with melancholy ("One Way Out Of The Maze").
The final part of the work offers us two longer moments considering the duration, since we come from brief sound watercolors enclosing the aforementioned 5 tracks in about 10 minutes, which will be appreciated by early Grubbs fans: the nearly 9 minutes of "Hurricane Season", struggling between the minimal pianism of the first part and electronic drones with Conradian influences and the closing track "Coda (Breathing)", an avant noise excursus still in the company of Matmos.

In "A Guess At The Riddle", Grubbs demonstrates, if it was still needed, that he is an artist of class and this time melancholy gives way to a rarefied serenity that he has rarely shown in his career.
However, do not mistake this serenity for a step back in his production because the ideas in this record are all there (the same old ones for God's sake...) by David Grubbs, but those who appreciate our Anti Guitar Hero will find a person behind the guitar this time, compared to the usual absorbed and frowning grin.

1. Knight Errant
2. Cold Apple
3. Wave Generators
4. Magnificence As Such
5. Neophyte
6. Rosie Ruiz
7. You'll Never Tame Me
8. Your Neck Of The Woods
9. One Way Out Of The Maze
10. Pangolin
11. Hurricane Season
12. Coda (Breathing)

Release date: 2004

Record label: Fat Cat