Charlie Hunter - Friends Seen & Unseen

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Free Music Notes for Friends Seen & Unseen

Free Music Review: There was a time . . .
Hit: 5 Stars

That time is past.

Thank goodness.

Since he first began plying his trade as one of the very few practitioners of eight-string, bass 'n' rhythm/comping/lead guitar playing in the history of jazz, he has staked out territory almost exclusively his own. Everyone from casual listeners to professional guitarists scratches his head in amazement at both the brain ordering and manual dexterity necessary to play both bass and guitar lines simultaneously.

But the time eventually comes when the novelty wears off. What then? Unless an iconoclastic artist like Hunter can develop an authentic voice worth hearing, there's not a whole lot left.

With his last two discs, Right Now Move and esp. this one, Friends Seen and Unseen, Hunter has honed his approach to a point where he transcends the limitations of his instrument.

A question regarding Hunter has always either been directly in play or at least hanging on the fringes of any encounter with the man or his music, namely, Why don't you just hire a bass player and concentrate on developing your guitar technique? Friends Seen and Unseen, I believe, definitely answers that question.

Stripped down to a trio format, with longtime mates John Ellis (tenor sax, bass clarinet, and flute) and Derrek Phillips (drums) on board, this group on Friends . . . stakes out and defines a kind of bloozy/funky territory all its own. Hunter has been slowly working his way up to producing a disc of this magnitude, and, after nearly a decade, has finally nailed it. All the effort honing his approach, integrating his brain and fingers, has finally delivered the kind or relaxed, entirely pleasurable, impossible-to-gainsay disc that fans of his have, lo these many years, yearned for.

What vaults this disc ahead of Right Now Move is the results he achieves with the minimal sound palette. In a way, it's a lot easier to make a memorable statement with a larger ensemble of players, e.g., recent efforts by Mike Brecker, Wayne Shorter, Josh Roseman, and others. That I believe he did with his last disc. Having the confidence gained from its nearly universal success both commercially and popularly, Hunter took a chance and returned to the paired-down format of bass/guitar, sax, and drums. Perhaps it's just that after doing this kind of thing for the last decade has finally enabled him to reach critical mass; perhaps the stars were somehow serendipitously aligned; perhaps these players have achieve a kind of group simpatico that only occasionally visits those who've been faithful to their muse. I don't know. What I do know is that this is one smokin' disc.

I confess that I prefer Hunter in a more adventurous setting, as with, e.g., Garage a Trois, but this disc, if carefully attended to, graces the thoughtful listener with its own unique pleasures. Not to be missed.

Friends Seen & Unseen Poster

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