El Espacio Entre

Raül Refree is an acclaimed producer and collaborator, sought after by artists as diverse as Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Ricky Martin and Rosalía, and his solo work evinces an openness to sonic exploration that you’d perhaps expect. The title of this release, El Espacio Entre, or ‘The Space Between’ evokes its hard-to-place musicality as well as its searching quality. Refree has a keen ear for beautiful phrasings as heard on the moody opening track ‘Lamentos de un Rescate’ and, for just 40 seconds, on ‘Lamentos de un Día Cualquiera’. That word ‘lamentos’ may seem to say it all, but ‘un día cualquiera’ is ‘any old day.’

Refree also relishes noise and discord, melodrama, sweeping synths, tapes and loops, driving and chaotic percussion; in fact, anything is allowed so long as it's unpredictable and, even in the most complicated way, mellifluous. ‘La Radio en la Cocina’ crackles with interference, but also ripples with a gently plucked mandolin. ‘Una Nueva Religión’ sounds like church music for a post-industrial faith, the hymn propelled by strange, unnerving sounds of shaking and vibrating. ‘La Plage’ is a melancholy reconfiguring of a Monteverdi madrigal which features a distorted and quite beautiful soprano vocal. Inspired conceptually by the Spanish silent film The Cursed Village (1930), this is a fine auteur album about home and travel, loss and absence, that subjects Iberian and other traditions to its own principles. El Espacio Entre makes it abundantly clear, Refree doesn't require a big name sidekick to make stunning records.