“Guitars & whatnot” is how Oren Ambarchi has been describing his choice of instrumentation in recent years. If that suggests nothing out of the ordinary, the reality is altogether different. Listeners new to Ambarchi’s music would be forgiven for doubting they were hearing any guitars at all.
Ambarchi avoids familiar chord progressions, riffs and song forms in favor of shimmering organ-like tones, glitches, pulses and evolving rhythmic motifs. Using a tabletop bank of pedals and mixer, which he manipulates on the fly, he creates a three-dimensional field of sound that belies its origin in his Gibson Les Paul.
