The music on ”Arbor” takes a more minimalistic and defined collective approach where the use of long, sustained sounds binds together a broad palette of string-and percussion-instruments. The band mentions Eric Satie, Earth, Morton Feldman, and Oren Ambarchi as important references. Repetition and duration play a major role on ”Arbor” as the music unfolds slowly and leaves a lot of room for a focus on details. ”Patience is bliss” statesbass player Jo Berger Myhre.
Splashgirl play improvised music that doesn ́t sound improvised. This time they wanted to have a more collective approach to the music, and by improvising they have found sounds and song-ideas that they have developed further during the recording sessions. ”Arbor” also features contributions by pedal steel guitarist Anders Hofstad Sørås, and singer/songwriter/soundartist Lasse Passage, two musicians with whom Splashgirl have been working closely with the last couple of years.
Splashgirl was formed in 2004 on an initiative from pianist Andreas Stensland Løwe. He, Jo Berger Myhre and Andreas Lønmo Knudsrød had known each other since highschool, and had played together in several other bands. Their debut album “Doors. Keys” on Aim Sound City was released in 2007 to rave reviews.
”Arbor” was recorded in an old tree house called Biermannsgården in Oslo, and mixed by Ingar Hunskaar before pre-mastered to analogue tape by Lasse Passage.
