By Brian Pace
06/14/01

Greg Howard confuses me.

First, he requests that his new album be reviewed by us right on the heels of the Everyday reviews - ones that presumably would scare off all but the most self-assured artists from requesting the same be done to one's own work. So, I get the album and listen. And re-listen. And re-listen again. At the risk of sounding like something out of Mr. Holland's Opus, I've listened to this thing over and over and over again, trying to figure it all out, and how best to relate that to you. I can't do it.

This is why you should immediately rush out and purchase this album.

As some of you already know, one of my favorite things to do both consciously and subconsciously is to compare works to one another so that the reader has a reference point to what I'm reviewing sounds like. The problem here is the Greg Howard Band's new album sounds like somebody different each time I hear it, and for that matter each song I hear on the album makes me think of somebody else. What's surprising also is that with a few exceptions (Keith Jarrett), the people I'm reminded of aren't jazz folks like the Greg Howard Band. Or, maybe, neither are the Greg Howard Band.

What's so alluring about this band and this album is the realization that it's going to take a long time to figure everything out and see how all the parts fit. See if you can say the same thing about "So Right." Uh-huh. Greg Howard solo has been doing this on the Chapman Stick for years - but the quantum leap here is that Greg has formed a band and made the substantial transition from Consummate Stickist to Consummate Musician. In true cock-your-head-to-the-side-and-look-quizzical Greg Howard fashion, nothing in America was good enough for him - he had to go to the jazz Mecca of Holland to form his band. And, while the instrumentation often closely mimics that of the Dave Matthews Band, they don't sound like...well, yes they do! I've become so accustomed to tempering any comments about Virginia bands with some distancing from DMB that it's become second nature. Virginian artists have, for the last decade, played under the great burden that is the DMB, trying to sound enough like them to be the "next" DMB commercially and yet not sound like them so as not to get pegged as such and lose the momentum to be the "next DMB." It's a horrendous Catch-22.

Greg Howard's triumph is that with this new work he's managed to step out into a band setting, sound like a bunch of things all at once, and not worry if one of those things is the scrawny kid from Miller's. Lift bounces, floats, soars, and then kicks your ass.

My bet on the keeper of the album is the final track - and no fair to those of you who will skip to it based on this review. "Experimental Sunrise" shows more than anything else Greg's growth as an well rounded artist - the Stick is almost a background instrument for much of the piece, allowing his colleagues to build the mood and augment the instrument in a way which previous Stick pioneer bands like King Crimson rarely even attempt. So, yes, Greg Howard still confuses me. I own 1500 CDs, and I can't point to a single one that sounds like Lift - including the entirety of the Greg Howard solo catalogue. If you like hearing great stuff you've never heard before and especially if you're a fan of Peter Gabriel, Keith Jarrett, Sting, King Crimson, Thelonious Monk, or, yes, Dave Matthews Band, you simply can't make a better next purchase.

nancies.org | June 14, 2001