Guitarist Nels Cline has generated a high profile since becoming a member of Wilco, but it’s his solo work that defines him -- he can always be counted upon to thwart expectations. Initiate is the fourth album by the Nels Cline Singers, a power trio with Devin Hoff on contra and electric bass, and Scott Amendola on drums, percussion, and electronics. Initiate is a double-disc recorded by producer David Breskin and engineer Ron Saint Germain. The first disc is a studio recording, the latter was cut live in San Francisco in 2009. Disc one's second track, “Floored,” kicks off with Amendola's drum kit followed by an exploratory fusion funk groove with Cline moving angularly around Hoff’s electric bass (think Tony Williams’ Lifetime). “Divining” is a hallucinatory track that commences acoustically with mbiras and double bass before Cline's acoustic enters. It gradually mutates texturally and dynamically to become an open-ended electric jazz-cum-world music orgy, as wordless vocals and layers of percussion move it toward a far freakier geography -- it's a more dangerous-sounding exploration of terrain that Pat Metheny is familiar with. “Grow Closer” mutates around various Latin tropes and rhythmic patterns occasionally drifting into North African modes. “King Queen” explores the early Santana band’s ability to jam around a theme with killer organ by guest David Witham. Cline responds aggressively and imaginatively to the band's shapeshifting, hypnotic rhythms.

1		Into It
2		Floored
3		Divining
4		You Noticed
5		Red Line to Greenland
6		Mercy (Supplication)
7		Grow Closer
8		Scissor / Saw
9		B86 (Inkblot Nebula)
10		King Queen
11		Zingiber
12		Mercy (Procession)
13		Into It (You Turn)
14		Forge
15		Fly Fly
16		Raze
17		And Now the Queen
18		Blues, Too
19		Thurston County
20		Sunken Song
21		Boogie Woogie Waltz