Wednesday, September 8, 2021

Synaesthesia (1996), by Andy Summers

Andy Summers goes a little bit grunge on this dark, edgy, and lyrical album that plays somewhat like a more muscular version of his 1989 release The Golden Wire.

Summers' thick guitar lines are reinforced with lush textures by Mitchel Forman on keyboards, rocking rhythms by Jerry Watts on bass, and pulse-pounding back-beats by Cream's Ginger Baker on drums, with additional drums by Gregg Bissonette and orchestral accents by The Trouserfly String Quartet, featuring world-renowned violinist Charlie Bisharat.

Summers also plays acoustic bass on one tune, and the title track is performed entirely by Summers on piano and sounds very much like an acoustic version of The Police's synthesizer style, especially from Ghost in the Machine.

This ranks among my top three favorite Andy Summers “band” albums, the other two being World Gone Strange and Earth + Sky. All three are composed entirely by Summers, are his most guitar-centric albums, and feature his most focused, consistent playing.

--Raj Manoharan

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