Gabriel Ríos

A change of course saw Ríos abandoning electronic instruments and beats and recording his third album The Dangerous Return (2010), with jazz pianist Jef Neve and frequent collaborator Kobe Proesmans on percussion.

A growing attraction to performing solo led to a three-year informal residency at Rockwood Music Hall where he met musician/producer Ruben Samama, who would go on to play contrabass and also produce the record.

It became apparent that the album would have to be recorded live with limited overdubbing and, searching for an adequate room, they ended up in Dreamland Studios, a converted wooden chapel in Woodstock, New York.

The special edition of the record contains a short story titled A Marauder's Midnight that was penned by Ríos and friend Keith Godfrey, and illustrated by Belgian artist Tinus Vermeersch.

It’s a heady concoction that’s simultaneously nostalgic and iconoclastic in the rediscovery of a musical hemisphere that Rios left behind two decades ago when leaving Puerto Rico for Europe.