We introduced Husmo Hav a couple of years ago, but this recent EP had escaped me. The last review was of a song which is included on it, ‘Never Ending Summer’, which I described as being like the soundtrack to a Colombo episode, followed by an outro straight out of the Keith Emerson ‘Moog Synthesiser for Dummies’ manual.
But that isn’t what Husmo Hav (they say it means ocean but according to Google Translate it means Husmo Hav) is really about. While calling themselves purveyors of cinematic instrumental music and genre-defying, they are, to my mind at least, really a jazz quartet, the sort you might find playing to a small but appreciative audience drinking pints of London Pride down at Ronnie Scott’s on a February Tuesday evening; John Thomson’s Louis Balfour character from The Fast Show’s ‘Jazz Club’ sketch lounging in a corner. Nice.
This track, ‘Mining for Gold’ is similar in its semi-structured format to the other four songs on the EP apart from Never Ending Summer. It revolves around the trumpet work of Thomas Husmo Litleskare before Marte Eberson’s synthesiser cuts in for a while and has a mysterious, well yes, cinematic quality about it, or perhaps more of a TV series one. Think of those 1960/70s TV series like The Avengers, or The Prisoner. Yep, you can imagine Patrick McGoohan chasing those big balls across the Portmeirion sands to this.
Better still, an episode of Man in a Suitcase, with a beaten up McGill looking for revenge on the streets of London. Or even the latter day Killing Eve as Villanelle stalks another victim.
If you can imagine the music that goes with any of the above you’ve nailed Husmo Hav; at least on this song.
Husmo Hav are:
Thomas Husmo Litleskare: Trumpet
Stian Andreas Egeland Andersen: Bass
Tore Flatjord: Drums
Marte Eberson: Keys