Labor of Love: Sarah Louise

Nighttime Birds and Morning Stars is Sarah Louise’s most fearless work to date. Louise broadens beyond folk forms on her latest, turning streams of raw electric guitar into entire oceans of aural texture. Her rich playing is warped beyond recognition through inventive synthesizing and digital manipulations. The innovative songs share warmth and compositional tendencies with Deeper Woods; however, remarkably, Sarah Louise’s stunning sophomore Thrill Jockey album breaks through the boundaries of solo guitar, bearing little resemblance to its predecessors.

Louise’s daring blend of heartfelt stream of conscious playing and bold studio processing demonstrates her unique ability to craft poignant music regardless of what tools she uses. She finds harmony rather than dissonance in synthesizing raw and organic materials with the technological. Sections of electronic bursts swell and ebb with a lifelike pulse, collapsing distinction between the natural and artificial. Each piece inhabits its own biosphere and Louise’s guitar and voice act as the flora and fauna. With Nighttime Birds and Morning Stars, Sarah Louise has re-imagined the limitations of guitar music to create a work of sublime resplendence.

Curious about some of the tone present on Nighttime Birds and Morning Stars? Here's what Sarah uses to achieve her unique mastery of her signature sound. We've included some like gear below to produce your own take on her tone journey!

Apogee Duet interface
Rhode NTK mic
1972 Guild F-212
2004 Mexican HSS Stratocaster
Reaper (DAW)
1980s Casio SK-1 Sampling Keyboard
Tascam Field Recorder
1960s Airline Amplifier

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