Speechless

After the monumental Guitar Solos and the surprisingly accessible Gravity, Fred Frith’s third solo album carved out a musical path somewhere between the first two. On several tracks he worked with the French avant-garde ensemble Etron Fou Leloublan, creating music that was clearly composed but also wildly freewheeling; on several others he is with his bandmates from Massacre, whose Killing Time was released the same year. Much of the music on this album seems more inward and serious than the more poppy and freewheeling Gravity.