In Line

Bill Frisell has contributed to and headlined some career-defining records for ECM over the years, but my heart belongs to In Line. Recorded five years before his seminal Lookout For Hope, it blends electric and acoustic guitar textures, gently accompanied by bassist Arild Andersen, whose deeper strings feel like an extension rather than an augmentation of Frisell’s. Of special note is “Throughout” for its lachrymose chord progression (don’t miss its classical reimagining by Gavin Bryars on the ECM New Series album Vita Nova). Those new to Frisell would do well to start here.

Bill Frisell’s 1983 solo debut remains an astounding listen forty years after its initial release. Accompanied only by bassist Arild Andersen (who plays on only five of the album’s nine tracks), Frisell delivers an all-original program that includes the gorgeous “Throughout” (on which he overdubs acoustic and electric guitars) and the sweetly elegiac “Shorts.” Frisell tone positively glistens, and the music he is making here was unlike anything else on the scene at the time — or since.