Gottsching started playing classical guitar as a child but became a fan of bands such as the Rolling Stones and Fleetwood Mac as a teenager. Both these bands have guitarists with distinctive styles and a Blues background, a musical genre that Gottsching draws on in his work, even though his compositions are considered avant-garde and progressive rather than mainstream rock. He also studied improvisation with Swiss avant-garde composer Thomas Kessler. This, combined with the fact that songs in the German language were not widely liked in Europe and beyond, led Gottsching to concentrate on instrumental composition.
Manuel Gottsching used a TEAC A3340 four-track tape machine and a Revox A77 to create echo effects. Along with his guitars he used a wah-wah pedal, a volume pedal, Sola Sound Fuzz, Schaller Rotosound and a Hawaiian steel bar. At the time of making this album, Gottsching created with a minimum of equipment and says that the result "sounded like sequencers and synthesizers" but he actually only used one guitar. He also says that his use of various pedals and recording at different speeds was crucial to creating his style.
The album consists of three tracks titled "Echo Waves," "Quasarsphere" and "Pluralis." According to reviewer Mark Richardson at Allmusic.com, the use of echo and delay create a sound similar to the musical style of Tangerine Dream, a progressive rock group contemporary with Gottsching. The first track is described as trance-like with its repeated rhythms that end in a guitar crescendo. The other tracks are gentler and more meditative. Richardsom compares them to Robert Fripp. The final track consists of numerous variations on one simple guitar sequence.
On the "Inventions" album, Gottsching plays all the guitars. However, for the first live performance of the album in Paris in December 1974, Lutz Ulbrich and John Strawn joined him to play second guitar and syntehsizer. Gottshcing and Ulbrich continued their partnership and gave further live performances of the composition in France and England in 1975.