SHAPES OF THINGS
Kerry Leimer | Makawao, Hawaii United States | 12/01/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"From the perspective of art n' commerce as it is practiced today, the case could easily be made that any single artist being open to the many styles music can express and enfold is in effect in cahoots with some dire and unforgiveable conspiracy focused on betraying Marketing Law. The resulting chaos -- File Under... what? -- could conceivably begin to weary the rock-hard predictability so many mainstream music fans demand, and so many purchasing agents and inventory clerks laud. While there seem to be very few artists left who are capable of approaching their work free of any particular, overriding and often overbearing stylistic prejudice, Leo Abrahams -- who we initially meet as a guitarist on Brian Eno's "Another Day on Earth" -- can be counted among them. His first CD, "Honeytrap", gives us 14 pieces of music, each pretty well taken on its own, highly musical, terms. Far-ranging, curious, receptive, sometimes humorous and always adventurous, "Honeytrap" is guitar-centric in only the broadest sense. The music displays an impressive range of techniques and execution, largely employing acoustic instruments treated in ways that serve musical demands rather than simply being drowned and droned for the sake of sound. The results, hard or soft, fast or slow, are often delicate and subtle and unusually melodic. The gaps between notes and phrases shimmer with information and an expert shading, often shifting the apparent intention of any given piece into a new context. If all this begins to sound almost indescribably pleasant, it is. Yet the music never collapses into sheer, airheaded prettiness. It reaches for an elusive sort of beauty by respecting more intricate ideas about form, rhythm and harmonic structure. "Honeytrap" fits somewhere, somehow. And while it is far from electronic music, it finds itself very near to "and otherwise"."
Track Listings (14) - Disc #1
