If you were a fan of Bruce Springsteen before he became a mega-star, you might remember that David Sancious was his soulful and jazzy keyboardist, bringing a hip feel to his classic album The Wild, The Innocent and The E Street Shuffle as well as his debut. Sancious hopped off the band and instead has done side work for artists ranging from Peter Gabriel to Youssou N’Dour along with releasing very infrequent albums of his own.
Here, he releases a tasty album where he plays piano, organ, synthesizer, guitar, and even sings quite well supported by a rotating drum team of Adriano Molinari, Weill Calhoun, Joe Bonadio, Michael Bland and famed stick man Vinnie Colaiuta. The first half of the songs have him singing some political/social songs, with a dramatic EWF-ish “Eyes Wide Shut”, a hip-hoppish “If” that has a message voiceover and a sleek 70s R&B pulsed “In The Middle Of The Night” along with a strutting “Urban Psalm #3”. The instrumentals feature melodic piano and impressive flamenco guitar on “December”, a mix of lush synth with piano on a Weather Report-esque “The Tree House” and “Flip It” and an evocative closer on “War In Heaven”. Each song is a musical piece of a rich and colorful mosaic, making you wonder which one will be exposed most if he ever comes to concert in So Cal. This album makes me remember how much I liked his work with The Boss; he’s even better self-employed.