Dream Box

*Dream Box* is a different type of solo guitar album for Pat Metheny than 2003’s *One Quiet Night* and 2011’s *What’s It All About*, which were performed unaccompanied on baritone acoustic. The closest parallel is 1979’s *New Chautauqua*, in its blended palette of acoustic and electric guitars and its multitracked approach. But the provenance of this new music also sets it apart. It’s selected from a stash of private recordings made for personal reference, ideas that sprung more or less from Metheny’s subconscious over time. The intent was never to make an album, but nonetheless a fully formed and satisfying one emerged. *Dream Box* is mainly original save for the standard “I Fall in Love Too Easily,” Luiz Bonfá’s “Morning of the Carnival” (or “Mañha de Carnaval”), and “Never Was Love” by the late pianist Russ Long (né Longstreth). Long was a peer from Metheny’s native Kansas City who featured the guitar master with this song on his 2006 release, *Time to Go: The Music of Russ Long*. Long died the same year, making this new version a poignant homage. The template for these pieces is mainly a chordal accompaniment track with a lead melody track—a Metheny duo, essentially, much like on “Unity Village” from his 1976 debut, *Bright Size Life*. There is variation, however, in the choice of acoustic baritone for the chords and rich bass notes in “From the Mountains” and “Ole & Gard,” incidentally the album’s two advance singles. The lyrical waltz “P.C. of Belgium” is another fine addition to the Metheny songbook. “Clouds Can’t Change the Sky” is an outlier, the album’s one fully unaccompanied piece, a continuous and thoroughly absorbing electric guitar performance, with a highly unusual harmonic turn occurring at the five-minute mark.

The 68-year-old guitar virtuoso compiled this understated set of solo recordings from a forgotten folder during downtime on tour. These casual experiments offer a fascinating peek into his creative mind.

Dream Box is Pat Metheny's third date for BMG's Modern Recordings, a set of nine solo tunes for electric guitar, drawn from a folder on his laptop's hard drive.