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Artist: Clark Yost
Album: On the Ball
CD Review: Clark Yost’s 9 tracks are on the ball, and filled with the night eyes of jazz. Smooth vocal jazz, you might call it, and very certainly some of the smoothest from an unknown. Well. He’s certainly no novice to the world of lite guitar jazz. He’s been playing since he bought his first acoustic guitar in 1965.

Yost’s element is in the field of melody and laying down a hot bed of underlying sound onto which the leads can ease themselves. Great bass and snappy drums make this a small but tight sounding band. But ya know what? It’s not a band, it’s Yost doing all sounds. Of special importance are the 1st and last tracks, instrumentals that show off Yost’s subtle and almost new age style approach to the guitar as an echoey chamber of charm.

Perhaps one of the best melodies comes from ‘Here Comes That Ending Again.’ Yost’s ghost vocals bleed over the deepness of the midnight. The guy knows how to construct Cool. You don’t do it with hammer, nails and tongs, you buy yourself some strong fingers, a little heartbreak, some synth, a bottle of rye and enough skill to last 30 years. That’s all you need.

Yost’s got all that, and you might want to check yourself for a 2nd opinion.

www.mapleislandrecords.com/clark