Wendy Eisenberg - Viewfinder 2LP

Every year there’s one album that I hear in January and think, “Damn, I wish I’d heard this earlier as it sure as hell would have made my best of the year list.” And this year’s awardee for me has been Wendy Eisenberg’s Viewfinder.

A member of the Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet, Eisenberg’s latest is an ambitious and eclectic trip from virtuosic guitar through to full band arrangement. The spiel is that this is a concept album meditating on “concepts of vision, the visible, signs, viewpoints, [and] eyes themselves” that arose after they received laser eye treatment in 2021.

Eisenberg’s dicing with the issue of exploring the visual via sonic means and nodding towards John Berger, Jacqueline Rose, and Jonathan Crary in the liner notes may make it seem like this record is some sort of academic exercise (and it does definitely deserve some sort of longer form critical engagement—if this exists please point me in it’s direction!—this record holds up without all that info as one of the most enjoyable jazz records of recent years.

Viewfinder finds them composing for a large improvising group that dips between guitar led band arrangements, to songs featuring Eisenberg’s guitar and vocals upfront to more abstract passages featuring trombone, trumpet, and electronics.

Gastr Del Sol’s discography seems to be the nearest touchpoint to this LP in their melding of instrumental composition, song, and understated guitar heroics, but meeting an almost Ornette Coleman-esque approach to jazz composition.

-Mitch