Dave Holland – Bass

I struggled with this album when it came out – a bit too ‘electric’ for me but I have learned to trust my favourite artists and, sure enough, it was there when I was ready to hear it. I was knocking around with a guitar player friend of mine, Mike Spearman, recently and he called this tune which, at that point, I was not aware of. I enjoyed playing it and revisited the record to my great pleasure. Kevin Eubanks just bleeds all over this.

This tune is called ‘The Empty Chair (For Clare)’ and is dedicated to Holland’s wife who passed away during this period. I have always struggled with tunes written as epitaphs – they are always so hard to listen to. It must have been harder to write and harder to perform for everyone involved. It’s a lovely tune and has a lovely blues feel. I am hearing in 3:4 but there are other ways of seeing it so, if you hear it differently, I apologise. The album is ‘Prism’ from 2013.