Jonas Hellborg is a world renowned
bassist having played with a plethora of bands and musicians as
diverse as John McLaughlin, Material, Public Image Ltd. and Ginger
Baker. He's best known as a jazz fusion player, and although this his
debut album shows him a solo player in the strictest sense, it's
still a fusion album, with fusion moods, fusion moduses and fusion
methods. Stripping away every other musician to let the electric bass
be all and everything doesn't change that. And if your standard
fusion album is a group exercise in picking fluff out of your
umbilicus, "The Bassic Thing" even more of a belly button scrutiny. I never
understood the notion of the bass – or for that matter, the drums – as a solo
instrument as anything but a show-off by someone who doesn't know his
or her place in an ensemble setting. And a show-off this is. I'm bored to ashes before even the first track
is finished, and then there's 35 more minutes to suffer by. File under 'patience flagellation'.
Full album
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