“ On A New Way to Pay Old Debts, Orcutt is at it again with a four-string guitar, this time bending blues and folk in ways they weren’t originally meant to go. Wrinkled riffs twist like wayward roots, punctured by thorny protrusions and unexpected potholes. Notes are warped and strangled, rhythms bruised and battered, all resulting in a sound at the outer edges of the Americana family tree… The traditions informing Orcutt’s playing, from those of pioneering bluesmen to John Fahey and other forward-thinking folk, are referenced in fleeting fragments, like images distorted and barely visible in a broken mirror.
March 20, 2011
