Peripheral Visions

Brooklyn-based guitarist-composer Grant Gordy's first album in more than a decade, Peripheral Visions, is an impressive addition to the chamber grass catalogue. The album's ten tracks pretty much outline the state of the genre with highly refined compositions distinguished by pleasing, if sometimes purposely twisted, melodies; virtuosic riff management over carefully orchestrated chord changes; and refreshingly nuanced harmonic soundscapes. Gordy, a former six-year veteran of the David Grisman Quintet, regularly dallies with Tony Trischka and Aoife O’Donovan and currently has a band called Mr Sun with fiddle maestro Darol Anger, mandolinist Joe Walsh (The Gibson Brothers) and Scots bass phenomenon Aidan O’Donnell.

On Peripheral Visions, O’Donnell also serves alongside Gordy together with Alex Hargreaves on violin and Dominick Leslie on mandolin. Hargreaves imbues ‘Espionage’ with a slinky cool, noir-ish vibe. ‘The Alben Triangle’ uses an oblique angular attack and relentlessly swinging tempo to measure the mettle of each ensemble member. Similarly, the cleverly juxtaposed rhythmic changes in ‘Journey to Miniera’ inspire breathtakingly dexterous solos by Gordy, Leslie and O’Donnell. By contrast, ‘International Klein Blues’ places everyone on the back porch for a low down, gutbucket ramble. Let's just hope Gordy doesn’t wait another decade to follow-up on Peripheral Visions.