Eivind Opsvik, Overseas III

Eivind Opsvik is a Norwegian bass player currently based in New York, and he’s assembled some excellent sidemen for his “Overseas” jazz project. His latest album, Overseas III, features Tony Malaby on tenor and Kenny Wolleso on drums, as well as pedal steel player Larry Campbell, and this instrumentation gives the project a unique sound. The pieces here cover a range of musical ground, but most revolve around Opsvik’s obvious love of pop music.

One unusual idea is the song “Neil,” inspired by Neil Young’s Harvest album. Neil Young is not an inspiration commonly mentioned by jazz artists, particularly when it comes to his folk side. Ironically, the song sounds more like Frank Zappa than Neil Young, with the heavy use of keyboard and that Zappa-esque triplet feel. The song itself comes off as somewhat trivial and light.

“Silver” is a pretty tune that more successfully bridges the folk feel and the jazz ideas. The melody is perfect for the pedal steel featured here. The trading of melody between the saxophone and pedal steel would not be an obvious combination, but it works perfectly. Tony Malaby’s restrained solo matches the grace of the tune, while finding harmonic ideas in the tune that might not be obvious.

“Breath of Bark” is a faster rocker, with heavy drums and another beautiful pedal steel melody. The steel takes hold of the melody and doesn’t let it go, repeating it hypnotically for the entire song. Underneath it, everybody else goes wild, including Opsvik’s driving bass and saxophonic hysterics from Malaby. It keeps everything simple, which is exactly what the song needs.

Less successful are the more abstract pieces. “Everseas” is a long, slow-moving drone with some interesting ideas, but since the whole thing remains at the same sort of dynamic level, there isn’t nearly as much development. It might make a good movie score, though. “Ginger Rogers” and “Whiff of Wood” are more open-ended pieces that sound like Philip Glass outtakes. Some of the instrumental pairings are pretty, but not enough by themselves.

Opsvik obviously put a lot of thought into Overseas III, from the instrumentation to the music to the arrangements. Not everything here works, but there are a few interesting songs. There aren’t very many precedents for this sort of thing, so he doesn’t have too many examples to follow. Nothing here is boring, which is a good sign. With some more work and focus, he could turn this project into something killer.