Brad Barr The Winter Mission LP (Clear Red Vinyl)

For more than 20 years, Brad Barr has been counting the number 216. It's a mysterious number that seems to show up everywhere - from clocks and license plates to Ouija boards and receipts - and now it's also sewn the fabric of his new album, like the 216 stitches on a baseball. The Barr Brothers frontman has set aside his band, his microphone and even his lyric-sheet - picking up his instrument for a solo guitar album that ripples with immediacy, vulnerability, and the spell of six-cubed.

Barr spent decades developing his visceral approach to the guitar, first with The Slip and then across three LPs with the Barr Brothers. The Winter Mission - the follow-up to The Fall Apartment, Barr's 2008 solo debut - had its origins in an instrumental commission for New York City's All For One Theater. It "felt like a gift," Barr recalls - to have a sound he could explore all by himself, away from the road, during COVID's strange intermission.

Inspired by artists like Caetano Veloso, Mississippi Fred McDowell, D'Gary and John Frusciante, Barr set out to make music that was naked and unprocessed, but also occasionally loud - alive with a sense of wakeful intimacy. The number 216 was a constant theme. The guitarist first encountered the so-called "magic square" during a teenage acid trip; in the years since then it's become a talisman - one of the few areas where Barr feels mystical, sensing a genuine order in the universe. These songs pay tribute to that order - from 216's lofty mathematical and astrological properties to its function as an area code (for Cleveland).

Still, you don't need to believe in 216 to fall for this record. You don't even need to be able to count that high. It's enough to feel the grace that shimmers underneath these tracks, a wild music's secret scaffolding.

"Brad Barr wasn't planning on making another solo album. But a generous benefactor so adored the guitarist's 2008 release The Fall Apartment, that he paid for the sequel. No strings attached and no notes. All musicians should be so lucky because with a healthy budget and a surfeit of free time during the pandemic, Barr was able to craft another incredible collection of guitar instrumentals that finds the Canadian-born artist dabbling in a variety of styles and moods. He continues exploring West African guitar music on the whirling 'Magic Square' and album opener '3, 4, 5... 6,' plays around in a Robbie Basho-like folk/jazz zone on 'Prayer Beads' and 'Ancient Calendars' and explores the grimier corners of the Delta blues on 'Baseball.'" - Robert Ham, Paste Magazine

"Ah, now this is something a bit special. A record made how they used to be but taking full advantage of today's tech wizardry in production. Brad Barr plays some beautiful licks here on instrumental opus The Winter Mission. And there's a touch of the avant-garde too. This is music in its most pure raw form. It may be acoustic but that doesn't mean it isn't occasionally raucous. 'Your Dad's Awake' will remind listeners of a certain age of a stripped down Gong - remember them anyone? Elsewhere you get hints of 70's rock intros, trippy in a way and yet punchy rather than fully mellow. Putting this out in 2022 has allowed Barr to ensure every nuance is crystal clear and balanced. Yes vinyl is warm but it can also sound woolly, especially on such an intricate set of songs. Hearing those strings vibrate and the notes blend together so crisply is a wondrous thing. Themed around the magic of the mystical number 216 this is a complex record that also works for a more casual play." - Gary Trueman, Devolution Magazine

Mark your scorecards now because this is a sleeper masterpiece that will most certainly be in the conversation for best albums of 2022.

The Winter Mission is the type of album where it's easy to discuss every song on it at length. I could go into the splendid, amplified lap steel on Baseball or the gorgeous blues-style picking and killer beat on Magic Square, another one of my top picks here. All of these notes add to the conclusion that this is an album of riches that needs to be given plenty of listens and plenty of time. It will certainly reward you.

If you enjoy something a bit left field then The Winter Mission is definitely for you.