Getting a handle on the music of David Lord isn’t easy. The Wichita based guitarist showcases a unique conception on his 2023 album Forest Standards, Vol. 3. Is Lord filtering John Fahey through Ornette Coleman’s harmolodics? Elsewhere, he sounds like James “Blood” Ulmer interpreting Claude Debussy.
Lord echoed Thelonious Monk in a solo outing at Farewell on Saturday, March 9. Thorny and agitated, Lord’s hermetic approach resists categorization. Reverent members of an audience of 25 who paid a $10 admission charge seemed certain that Lord is among today’s most important artists.
Wearing a Depeche Mode shirt, V.Vecker preceded Lord with a mesmerizing set in which he looped riffs from his saxophone to construct swirling sonic monoliths. The evening began with the jagged power trio of Seth Andrew Davis, Aaron Osborne and Evan Verploegh.