Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

An instrumental album, one fully enveloped by the sound of a creative mind with no reason to embellish his work by the appearance of single inappropriate lyric, is something to behold and admire. It might not find favour with those who can’t live without the thoughts of the musician being mentioned in passing, but for those who find such pieces stirring or are happy enough to wallow in the arms of the edifying release that comes from listening to the inner workings of their own imagination as the sound of a gentle guitar takes them to places unknown, then Steve Garrett’s Even Song is a moment of class.

If praise be delivered then it should always be heard, it should be left in no doubt of the emotionally quality it brings to the listener and the sense of fulfilment it brings to the genre as a whole, Even Song is that praise personified and brought to the listener’s attention with a sense of dignity and charm. The guitar maybe King in this case but it certainly the noteworthy ability of the man performing which really causes much excitement.

Throughout the album what comes across with almost startling brilliance is just how softly the guitar in the hands of someone like Steve Garrett can become a weapon of beauty, one that just lets the notes being played hang in the air like butterflies caught on an updraft but whose own elegance and perfect sense of balance allows them to defy being swept away. That is the case with each song on the delicate and sensitively performed recording.

Whether in the shape of Ballad For E, the superb Tusen Tanker, the fabulous renditions of Peter Gabriel’s Mercy Street or Dire Straits’ Brothers in Arms or the interestingly coy Why Fum’th in Fight, each song carries that sense of enhanced decoration but with the knowledge that it is stripped bare of everything but quality and timing.

Steve Garrett’s Even Song is a very cool album in which to dedicate an evening to and in which to play till the heart is content.

Ian D. Hall