Edinburgh Jazz Festival
Magnus Ostrom Band
Queen’s Hall
Rob Adams
THREE STARS
IT IS now eight years since Swedish pianist Esbjorn Svensson, leader of the trio known as e.s.t., died in a diving accident, aged just forty-four. The final project discussed by Svensson and his group, a collaboration with a symphony orchestra, will be released later this year. Meanwhile, the surviving members are leading their own bands and forging their own styles.
While e.s.t. took jazz from the Thelonious Monk era as an inspiration to point towards the future, drummer Magnus Ostrom is creating music that’s evocative of prog rock’s 1970s heyday with the added penchant for repetition for effect that’s drawing listeners towards bands currently on the fringes of jazz such as GoGo Penguin and Mammal Hands.
Ostrom seems quite open about finding comfort in the music and places he visited in his youth, recalling with fondness The Green Man and the French Horn, a pub he frequented while living in London in his early twenties that is now celebrated in the ballad of the same name that features on his latest album, Parachute.
His prog-rock muse has been apparent for some time. Longing, a track from an earlier album that featured in the second set, was reminiscent of prog heroes Camel and achieved more of a natural flow than the newer pieces where the interlocking of guitar, bass, keyboards and Ostrom’s determined drumming often produced an effect that was more easily admired than loved.
He’s an engaging host, making entertainingly droll introductions, and his drum solo was pure theatre, leading to a finale and encore that trod a fine line but ultimately succeeded in being powerfully hypnotic.
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