WILLITS, CHRISTOPHER
SURF BOUNDARIES (GHOSTLY INTERNATIONAL)
Label:
GHOSTLY INTERNATIONAL
California-based guitarist Christopher Willits settles near the shores of pop with Surf Boundaries. On his breakthrough LP, Willits merges the patterns of his signature guitar sound with treated strings, brass and five-part vocal harmonies for a sonic vision that draws upon elements of shoegaze, jazz, ambient and noise.
Recorded during the rise and fall of an intense personal relationship, the album's spectrum of emotions naturally emerged from the sea changes of lovers' boundaries, and the ultimate necessity of freedom and letting go.
The vocal motif of the aptly titled "Colors Shifting" (sung by Willits and Ultra Records' Latrice Barnett) appears in three variations, giving the album a rough beginning, middle and end, while other tracks full of electrified drones, intertwining melody lines and smooth guitar loops weave into the album's structure seamlessly.
Named "the center cell of a rather complex indie rock-avant-garde electronic art Venn diagram" by the San Francisco Weekly, Christopher Willits proliferates artistic diversity in a unique context.
After known collaborations with Kid606, Matmos, Brad Laner, Taylor Deupree and Ryuichi Sakamoto, Willits finds a new voice on these recordings.
In these 12 tracks, Willits' view is so broad that anything becomes possible inside his unique vision of organic electronic music.
The process of creating this music was his most mysterious yet: "I felt like i was just along for the ride as I gave the music space to breathe and do whatever it needed to do".