Kevin Kastning - Otherworld

Kevin Kastning Otherworld cover
Kevin Kastning
Otherworld
Greydisc Records
2015
Kevin Kastning comes from Kansas, US (now he lives in Massachusetts) and apart from a skillful multi-instrumentalist & composer, he’s also a musical instrument inventor. I know that the last one mentioned may seem rather “weird” but Kevin prefers to play the instruments he has invented such as: the 36-string Double Contraguitar, 30-string Contra-Alto guitar and the 15-string Extended Classical guitar. Apart from the above-mentioned instruments, he also plays the 12-string Soprano guitar and the 6-string Classical guitar on this album.
 
Kevin has been playing music for quite some time and has released various albums (19 so far, including this one) with other musicians too like: Mark Wingfield, Carl Clements, Sándor Szabó, Michael Manring and so on. Kevin recorded the album at Studio Traumwald, Massachusetts US and Sándor mixed and mastered it at Tandem Records Experimental Studios in Hungary.
 
All the compositions are instrumental and follow a specific acoustic, tranquil, atmospheric & experimental path. This ain’t your typical show-off guitarist, who plays fast, weird stuff to impress his audience. Kevin follows the exact opposite way. Of course, it isn’t easy to play a 36-string Double Contraguitar, but he manages to do so and he also creates “strange musical” tracks which at times may sound a bit ritualistic. Certainly, this kind of music is not that reachable and easy to listen to on the whole. “Otherworld” mostly addresses those who fancy experimental acoustic instrumental music and have the time to wade into it.