Altered Zones

Last year's Psychic Mud Shrine put aside any doubts that Evan Caminiti of avant-metal duo Barn Owl couldn't bring the bucolic darkness on his own. Coming in quick succession, West Winds reveals him as a master of cavernous guitar. More meditative and solitary than his previous release, Caminiti's latest offering is blues for a scorched earth, evoking the kinds of dystopian futures found in Cormac McCarthy and Marcel Theroux novels. The label compares it to Hex-era Earth, and that's an apt comparison: Caminiti's music evokes a similar cinematic, Morricone-esque desolation. But in the end, West Wind owes mainly to its creator's own hand, creating lonesome drone-blues for a dawn that may never come.

MP3: Evan Caminiti: "Dust"

West Winds is available now on Three Lobed