Public Eyesore

One usually associates the acoustic guitar with mellowness and subtlety. But on Open The Door, the duo of guitarists Nels Cline and Elliott Sharp takes those preconceptions and restrings them, placing generally feverish free improvisations where campfire sing-alongs used to roam. Entirely acoustic, Open The Door can be gentle at times, too, but there’s always an undercurrent of menace. Door opens with “Blue Particles,” a moderate melee of plunks and plinks. “Isotropes” begins in blues territory – it’s sad, sighing slide guitar meshing with an ever-changing array
of backwoods chords. “Pietraviva” summons up spiky, Monkish melodies and yappy, rhythmic tapping. And “Five Tastes of Sour” is, for the most part, spare and contemplative, as its
lines are more concerned with leaving space than filling it.