Six songs, five guests. The Passing Through EP takes its name and its spirit from the idea of crossing through something — a place, a feeling, a life — without quite stopping. Five of the six tracks bring in a musician from a different part of the world; the last one closes the door quietly, alone.
The Passing Through EP grew out of a question: what would happen if each song brought in a musician from a completely different tradition? Not as a world music exercise — but as a genuine conversation between the blues and whatever showed up at the door.
Five guests, five countries. An accordion from Sweden. A balalaika from Russia. Pan flute and cobza from Romania. Sitar and tabla from India. And Nikos — the Greek bouzouki player who has been part of the band's world since long before the EP was conceived.
The title song, Passing Through, ends the EP. Two other versions of that song exist in the catalogue — the original single, and the live version with Mariann Voss on Live & Unspoken Vol. II. This one is the plainest of the three: no guest, just the band, closing the door they spent five songs opening.
Track Listing
Nikos and his bouzouki. He first played this song at a festival years before the EP existed — sitting in because nobody told him not to. The studio version finally gives that performance a permanent home.
Lars Eriksson on accordion. Swedish session musician who arrived through a mutual contact. The Last to Sit is about the person who stays longest at the table — and Lars's accordion gives it a quality that is simultaneously Nordic and deeply blues. The two traditions have more in common than either expected.
Alexei Volkov, balalaika, Russia. Their Dog is a song about loyalty — specifically the kind that does not need to be explained or acknowledged to be completely real. The balalaika's tone gives the song a folk quality that sits just outside the blues frame, pulling it somewhere unexpected and right.
Romanian duo — Elena Ionescu on pan flute, Gheorghe Constantin on cobza. The most celebratory track on the EP. The song is about the moment when the music is good enough that no one can stay still — and Elena and Gheorghe arrive at exactly the moment the song needs them most.
Priya Sharma on sitar, Rajan Mehta on tabla. The most unlikely crossover on the EP — blues and Indian classical music sharing the same twelve bars. They met at a festival in Bristol. What could have been a novelty turned out to be something genuinely new: both traditions understood the same thing about rhythm and repetition and the space between the notes.
The title track, and the only one on the EP without a guest. Just the band, closing the circle they opened with Tied to a Tree. Mariann Voss's oboe belongs to the live version on Live & Unspoken Vol. II — not this one.