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Öström is best known for playing in EST for 15 years up until the pianist Esbjörn Svensson’s untimely death in a diving accident in 2008. Here, he’s avoided trying to reproduce the piano trio’s acoustic sound and focuses on an airbrushed electric jazz, which owes much to the lush fusion-lite of guitarist Pat Metheny (who makes a guest appearance on Ballad for E). That said, the music here bears the same sort of relationship to electric jazz-rock as EST did to acoustic piano jazz: it is melodic, tasteful and, frankly, a little bland.
For all the distorted guitar solos present, there’s no escaping the fact that tracks like Longing have more than a hint of the coffee table about them, while Weight of Death and Between are soporific to the point of becoming musical sedative. It’s a shame because there are some promising moments peppered throughout the album. Piano Break Song is built around a Steve Reich-like piano figure, which, while not exactly a new idea, is pleasing enough. The Haunted Thoughts and the Endless Fall has more punch – and at four minutes is the shortest track on the album by quite some way. Yet, even here, Öström seems curiously restrained and rarely manages to break a sweat. The album’s finale, Hymn (For the Past) Part II, is 15 minutes of glacial post-rock in the style of Sigur Rós, which clearly strives to build an anthemic gravitas, but actually just feels cumbersome and overly-concerned with its own importance.
With their accessible melodies and clean-cut energy, EST were unusual in their ability to crossover and appeal to audiences from beyond the jazz world. While some of those listeners will surely want to check Öström’s first post-EST statement, it’s hard to imagine this release will gain him many new followers.
--Daniel Spicer
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Review
Ostrom's drumming was a key element in shaping the sound of the Esbjorn Svensson Trio, functioning at two levels, by providing the rhythmic spring to the trio's step, and proving a constantly shifting, shimmering colouristic backdrop that seemed to make the trio somehow sound a 'bigger' ensemble than that of three musicians. His return to the music scene after the devastation of losing a lifelong friend and close musical collaborator is thus a cause for celebration. A strikingly original musician, the first chapter of his new career post-EST provides a panoramic view of his own musical vision and this wide ranging album moves from ambient ('Longing') to jazz-rock ('Piano Break Song') to voice ('Alifia Mia') in an ensemble dominated by the lead voice of Hourdakis' guitar. It is fitting then that the centrepiece of the album, Ostrom's highly personal tribute to Svensson, 'Ballad for E', should have guest Pat Metheny on guitar in this moving musical soliloquy. With former band mate Dan Berglund, they jointly illustrate how music can mean so much more than mere words. --Jazzwise March 2011
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