Pablo Color is a Swiss musician, working on the periphery of a Zurich “scene” that includes Lexx, Phantom Island, and the Drumpoet Community. Artists associated with the club, Zukunft. A multi-instrumentalist, of Chilean descent, he describes the guitar has his “most important tool” – first plucking at its 6-strings in his early 20s, in response to heartbreak. The playing of Pat Metheny and Wes Montgomery subsequently becoming a primary influence. His album, La Calle Roja, successfully sonically translated the reds and golds of a Puerto Sagunto sunset, and was one of my top balearic records of 2018. 

The follow-up, Hora Azul, opens with previous single, Los Claveles 36 – a sublime strummed summer samba, that dances to the percussion of Pablo`s pal, Berlin Lama. This latin, Brazilian flavour, and Berlin`s fervor, also drives the bucolic bossa of Recuerdos. Señor Color constructs El Beso Y La Noche, “The Kiss Of Night” from acoustic dexterity, electric arcs, and dubwise effects. Painting pictures of blue skies crackling with the promise of a coming storm. Remixed by Miku-Mari and “Obscure Music” guru, Chee Shimizu, this track becomes perhaps the set`s centerpiece. The pair producing an eight-minute plus avant ambient float. A river of resonance, washed by sequences that flow like fresh water currents, and what could be pedal steel, as traditional Japanese / Asian elements drift in and out. Ethereal, but expanding to epic, emotional, proportions. Bird song just part of its shimmering whole. Illuminame is a languid, Peter Green-like blues, stroked, sedated, stoned, by the sun, while 9:32PM is a simmering heat haze of cicada song. Aire Nocturno pays tribute to John Martyn`s Small Hours, which I know is a firm favourite of Pablo`s. A tranquil twilight study for Swell guitar and Echoplex delay. Alpha Y Omega finds Color collaborating with Spanish post-rock master, Suso Saiz. Together they synthesize a sea, a deep ocean, of still, calm, sustain. El Abrazo, “Hug”, is fashioned from fine folk stylings, whose carefully crafted key changes will clear clouds from any horizon.

Pablo Color`s Hora Azul is available to order from ISH Records.