Roger Kleier (born 1958) is a “composer, guitarist, improviser and producer who began playing electric guitar at age 13 after discovering Captain Beefheart and Jimi Hendrix. He studied composition at North Texas State University and the University of Southern California, and has developed a unique style that draws equally from improvisation, contemporary classical music, and the American guitar traditions of blues, jazz, and rock. Much of his compositional work involves the development of a broader vocabulary for the electric guitar through the use of extended techniques and creating new works with digital technology.”

The Night Has Many Hours is an appropriately titled CD full of dark, ambient pieces for electric guitar, cello and organ. Overall, the whole album sounds heavily processed like a collection of electro-acoustic works, with lots of layers of grainy textures flitting and floating around the soundstage. Many of the tracks feature Joan Jeanrenaud sawing away on her cello in a most sprightly manner over Roger’s percolating electronic backdrop as Annie Gosfield backs it all upon organ. Occasionally, the cello offers up a sweet melody that at times turns stately, backed by distant guitar keens.

One track is even tethered down with a big, funky beat that Roger promptly attacks with a line of feedback guitar as synth stabs and washes and raspy buzzes join in the melee. Later, layers of burbling ambience support some downtuned guitar pluck with plaintive high-pitched wailing, followed by an array of repetitive, strange, hypnotic synth tones with washes that get hectic and build into a rhythmic climax. The final track offers up an epic synth bed with flitting electronics and a ghostly two-note call that perfectly buttons up this disc of pleasing guitar-based minimalism. According to the liner notes, it’s the third in a trilogy. Too bad I haven’t heard the first two.

Label: Innova Catalog Number: 685 Format: CD Packaging: Jewel case Tracks: 11 Total Time: 43:08 Country: United States Released: 2009 More: Discogs, Forced Exposure, Last.FM, Official, Wikipedia

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