Bneleti (ბნელეთი) – Self-Titled

Bneleti (ბნელეთი) is a solo project by the US-born, Georgia-based guitarist and composer Ben Wheeler. It’s been almost two months since he played three shows in Bulgaria, something few touring musicians take the time to do these days, and my memories keep going back to the unique place he created with his music. I’m saying place on purpose, as the name of the project, and thus the name of his first full-length album, comes from a pre-Christian Georgian word that translates to “Land of Darkness”.

I had the chance to interview Ben Wheeler ahead of his Bulgarian concerts, and he mentioned that by combining influences from the traditional music of the Caucasus region with his roots in the extreme and progressive music of the Seattle area, and his interests in modular synthesis, he hopes to achieve a sound that nobody has explored before. And quite frankly, he absolutely succeeded in doing so. While one can probably use the avant-folk and experimental tags, that’s just not enough for everything that’s poured into his music. Yes, if you’ve listened to Cascadian black metal, have explored the catalogue of Ored Recordings, or are native to the Caucasus region, you will certainly recognise certain influences that have been fed into the music of Bneleti.

However, what makes this album so special is the way Ben Wheeler has assembled all of this together. The music on this album, even if it is split into eight pieces, is for me an inseparable whole. It’s a reflection of all those inspirations, musical or experiential, being successfully fused in a music that’s constantly shapeshifting, pulsating and moving at its own pace, with its own purpose. The gentle acoustic timbre of the saz, sometimes harshly tremolo-picked or looped to infinity, the droning layers of distorted guitar riffs reminiscent of drone doom thickness, or the combination of both, are just a small example of how Wheeler experiments with his music-creating tools.

Sometimes the obscure intervals and playing techniques are employed not on the saz but on his regular guitar, probably as a nod to Azerbaijani electric guitar music, another of the inspirations behind Bneleti’s signature sound. And while not so accentuated on the record, but truly present in his live shows, is the effects processing and modular synthesis element in the music of Bneleti, further letting in additional textures, dynamic subtleties and, if you want, extra sonic control over the intricately written and structured work with the string instruments.

It’s beyond me to highlight any bits of this album for those who want to quickly skim through it and make out if that’s the music for them, because once I hit play, there’s no turning back from the Land of Darkness for me (I think I already said that). However, the album starts as convincingly as possible with “Hamson ჰამსონ”, and from then on the tension and musicianship only build up, unfold and evolve together into one of the most unique pieces of music you’ll experience.

So hit play and by the time you reach “T’q’eshi Shishi ტყეში შიში” I promise, you’ll have surrendered to Bneleti’s textural realm of abrasive sound, unorthodox melodicism and compositional craftsmanship, a realm where traditional music meets the unknown territories of contemporary sonic experimentalism.