Eivind Aarset - guitar
Audun Erlien - bass
Wetle Holte - drums
Erland Dahlen - drums

Sven Persson - sound engineer

Norwegian guitarist Eivind Aarset is one of the most recognizable authors of the contemporary European jazz and electronic scene, a musician whose expression has for decades been situated on the exciting border between improvisation, ambient electronics, rock and experimental jazz. His electric guitar often transcends its traditional role and becomes a source of layered textures, atmospheres and soundscapes of a distinctly cinematic character.

Aarset comes to Hrvatski dom Split with the Strange Hands program , shaped around his new album of the same name. After years of playing together with his quartet, Aarset continues to develop their recognizable common sound on this project, but at the same time consciously seeks new directions and avoids tried and tested solutions. The result is music that is more direct and stripped back than on some of his previous releases, but still permeated with characteristic transitions between light and dark, melody and abstraction.

On the album, written material and open improvisation are treated as equal creative forces. Solid riffs gradually dissolve into sound textures, abstract atmospheres suddenly grow into clear melodic units, while rhythm, space and mutual communication between musicians become as important as individual solo parts.

The uniqueness of Aarset's approach remains the way in which he combines electronic processing and the natural sound of the instrument into an almost inseparable whole. Behind the numerous effects and layers, however, his characteristic tone, sense of phrasing and precise shaping of each sound are always recognizable. Strange Hands thus represents a new chapter in his authorial world - music that simultaneously seems familiar and unpredictable, intimate and broad, acoustic and electronic.

About the Strange Hands project

Strange Hands was born from a long-standing collaboration between Aarset and his musicians, and a shared sense of sound, space, and improvisation. Aarset emphasizes that the foundation of the project is precisely the need to avoid repetition: the moment when the musicians feel that they have “been here before” becomes a signal to take a different path.

Most decisions are made intuitively, by listening to what sounds and feels right at a given moment. It is from this openness that music emerges, constantly hovering between the composed and the improvised, with a recognizable structure and complete sonic freedom.

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The program is based on the album Strange Hands.

Snow crash
The piece opens the program with futuristic, cutting figures and a powerful rhythm that gradually approaches the energy of indie rock. Guitar melodies fall apart and reassemble through shifting textures and electronically shaped sound.

Strange Hands
The title track develops a darker, slower-rising tension, built on a steady bass figure and Aarset's meandering guitar lines. The music creates an almost nocturnal, slightly disturbing atmosphere in which the melody develops more circularly than it resolves classically.

Road Moves
An atmospheric composition with a more pronounced melodic and almost indie-rock sensibility. A simple motif is gradually broken into fragments, only to be reassembled in a different sonic form.

The Deep Green
A more intimate and highly picturesque piece in which guitar textures meet violin and bansuri sounds. The piece gradually opens from a darker, more restrained beginning towards a brighter and more spacious soundscape.

Space BOB
A rhythmically expressive composition that combines elements of funk, blues and space rock, but constantly throws them out of the expected patterns. A solid rhythmic foundation carries the music through increasingly free and unpredictable harmonic changes.

Night Swimmer
The album's final track is almost weightless and meditative. Soft harmonies and a discreet pulse gradually shape a clearer melodic line, leaving the impression of a sound slowly disappearing into space.