Tuesday Wonderland

The Esbjörn Svensson Trio, or EST for short, are simply the hottest European jazz outfit in the world right now. Their brand of highly modernistic instrumental compositions have won plaudits from the likes of Pat Metheny and Jamie Cullum, while critical acclaim has been unrelenting over their 13-year history – auspiciously they became the very first European jazz outfit to grace the front cover of American jazz bible Downbeat.

This is their tenth album and it has to be said that to keep instrumental albums of any musical persuasion fresh for that amount of recording time is an achievement in itself. The album is called Tuesday Wonderland because, according to drummer Magnus Öström, "Tuesdays do not really have anything special about them in the thinking of most people, but if you start appreciating the small things in life, you might see Tuesdays in a different light".

Musically the album veers from abstract Sigur Ros-style guitar mayhem (as on Fading Maid Preludium) to the funky drum patterns and slinky double bass of the title track and the laid-back jazz piano murmurings of The Goldhearted Miner. Quite what the titles have to do with the music is anyone's guess. For example, Brewery Of Beggars is an intense piece dominated by spiralling piano that ebbs and flows in dramatic fashion, at one moment quietly contemplative, the next bustling with taut percussion patterns and manic double bass twangs. Such an inventive and playful album should surely follow their triumphant 'Viaticum' as the best-selling instrumental European jazz album of the year.