If his last album, Rivers and Bridges made you wonder if Steffen was moving toward more accessible, lyrical fingerpicking, the epic two-CD 7Books should give you a very resounding response (no). Diving back into his previous explorations of the guitar itself (as well as its incidental musicality), 7Books find Steffen in fine form.
Recorded live to DAT, the album is split into (obviously enough) 7 books.
With only two under 12 minutes, it's easy to see how this album is such an epic statement of Steffen's world.
Most of the tracks seem to follow a similar pattern. They begin minimally, with Steffen poking, prodding, or tapping the guitar in various places, eliciting various tones and coos. These evolve into a more vigorous, rhythmic sliding, ramming, or tapping repetition, which eventually splinters.
While a double CD may be a bit exhausting, this offers over an hour and a half of Steffen's compelling slide guitar work, as well as his top notch fingerpicking explorations. Of today's top fingerpicking guitarists (Jack Rose, Ben Chasny, Glenn Jones), Steffen is far and away the most distinctive, having charted his own path completely removed from all convention.
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