Meltframe, Mary Halvorson's first solo record, features the guitarist applying her unconventional style to both classic compositions by jazz greats and modern compositions by her contemporaries. What is immediately apparent, even from a cursory listen, is the range of the sonic palette of this record. Halvorson sometimes opts for an extremely aggressive and distorted hard-rock ready approach, like the first half of "Cascades" (Oliver Nelson), but also knows when delicacy is key, as shown in the subtle echo of the guitar in "Solitude" (Duke Ellington). Despite the fact that many of her fans may think of terms like "angular" and "cerebral" when looking for ways to describe Halvorson's approach to guitar, the solo setting seems to have freed her up to be just as expressive emotionally as she is impressive technically.
Although the guitarist has some pretty big shoes to fill, taking into account that some of these tunes, like "Ida Lupino" (Carla Bley) and "Aisha" (McCoy Tyner), have been played arguably perfectly by Paul Bley and John Coltrane respectively, Halvorson is up to the task. On "Ida Lupino" and "Aisha" she plays gorgeously, doing the original compositions justice while at the same time finding extremely innovative ways to reinterpret the songs. "Aisha" in particular is a stunner, this is partially because typically it is a song that is quite light, but Halvorson sporadically decides to push her guitar work towards darker and heavier sounds - an aspect of this recording that is sure to catch listeners by surprise.
If there is one thing that is not put in doubt by the end of this wonderful album, it's Halvorson's mastery of pedals and effects - even beyond her now idiosyncratic use of the delay pedal. Throughout Meltframe, Halvorson consistently, but tastefully, uses an effect which bends the tone of her notes, giving the sound a hazy, vibrato-like inflection. The use of this effect gives the clean guitar timbre found in songs like "Blood" (Annette Peacock) and "Cheshire Hotel" (Noël Akchoté) a slightly psychedelic quality. Halvorson's experimentation with pedals and effects reaches its apex during the second half of "Platform" (Chris Lightcap), with the guitar sounding absolutely sinister around the 3:09 minute mark as she blazes to the end of the song. Overall, with the release of Meltframe, Halvorson has presented another strong argument as to why she is one of the most interesting guitarists in jazz today
