James Blackshaw - The Glass Bead Game

01. Cross
02. Bled
03. Fix
04. Key
05. Arc

The surprisingly young James Blackshaw has been crafting beautiful long-form pieces on his 12-string for quite some time. But he's teamed up with Michael Gira's Young God label to release The Glass Bead Game. It could be a move that bodes well for Blackshaw, since Gira has a knack for either catching people in their prime (remember those first two Devendra Banhart records?) or opening bigger audiences up to great new bands like Akron/Family and Fire on Fire. But the move won't find Blackshaw sitting back on past successes. The Glass Bead Game will feature even more orchestration to build around his 12-string guitar and also, the guitar virtuoso insists, more singing. Quite a claim for a maker of mostly instrumental music. It should be interesting to see how he meshes these new elements into his already expansive sound, especially since the new stuff has already made Michael Gira cry, apparently...www.prefixmag.com