Saturday, May 5, 2012

The Esseness Project

I received this CD 2 days ago (from Inokii), it's something which I should have acquired earlier, really.

The Esseness Project- Ess-en-ess - is actually referring to S-N-S, which stands for Steve (Smyth) & Steve (Hoffman), on guitars & bass respectively. These aren't boring, ordinary players, they are virtuosos in their own right, once you hear what they have to offer, you'd have nothing but admiration for them. For this release, the duo got Atma Anur to drum the tracks. 

Some technical players went overboard to showcase their technicalities in their instrumental releases; you know they got the chops but what they play are tasteless. It's not 'musical' in this sense, a showcase of very accomplished practice sessions, nothing more. People like Smyth & Hoffman are very technical in their music but they have not forgotten humour & adventure, those are the critical ingredients in making this release enjoyable. Here's a clip of Smyth playing the opening track, The Afterlife for the EMG channel:



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