Oren Ambarchi, Johan Berthling and Andreas Werlin

Making good on promises left open on their first collaboration, Ghosted, Oren Ambarchi, Johan Berthling and Andreas Werlin return to the trio format for a proper follow-up, aptly titled Ghosted II. Ambarchi’s had a stellar run in the interim, culminating in the widely praised record, Shebang, which features Johan as a collaborator alongside Jim O’Rourke, BJ Cole, and Chris Abrahams. That release finds Joe Talia behind the kit, spinning its energy in a more circular direction. The record whirled with life, expanding and contracting with a flurry of activity. Ghosted II is by turns more austere, but no less engrossing, driven by the percussion of Swedish drummer Werlin, steering the icy ambiance of the record into strange winds.

As Ambarchi shaves his guitar sound down to something spectral, glowing with a quicksilver shimmer that’s somewhere between synth and spirit, Werlin lets the record retain its dance. The result is a feeling of silks tumbling in the wind — weightless and wondrous, the snap of fabric on wind providing a percussive touch. The beginning of the record continues on through this anti-gravity arc until “tre” brings it down to Earth. Here Berthling’s bass becomes the tactile center of song, circled by Ambarchi’s still otherworldly guitars and sparring with Werlin for the pulse of the record. The band arcs into the infinite as the second side clatters to a calm by the end of “fyra.” It’s a fitting continuation of Ghosted, and one that begs the band to keep this a series returned to again and again.

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