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JMI
Volume 8, Number 3
May / Jun 2008
Feature Article: Be Careful Of The Mark You Make
Benedict Schlepper-Connolly
Benedict Schlepper-Connolly talks to Paul G. Smyth, improvising pianist and keyboard player with The Jimmy Cake.
The full text of the article is here
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The Wire
Issue 296, Oct 2008
Outer Limits Keith Moliné
CD Review: For Christina Carter
“A 3″CD reissue of an 18 minute piece that originally appeared on a Foxglove label compilation, this showcases Irish pianist Smyth’s considerable gifts as an improvisor. Building from a few hesitant melodic daubings into a huge churning mass of tumbling arpeggios, it’s a genuinely cathartic listening experience. His approach is slightly reminiscent of a more crashing, energised version of The Necks’ mighty Chris Abrahams, in the way he causes his music to spiral outwards from a still point, covering a lot of ground with few abrupt dynamic or harmonic shifts. He just does it a lot more loudly. It would be interesting to see how he might be able to sustain such fuck-you intensity over a longer timeframe. I note with some amusement that he tags his MySpace site “the bad-tempered clavier”. Luckily for us, it sounds like he was particularly pissed off on the day he recorded this.”
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JMI
Volume 8, Number 1
Jan / Feb 2008
Live Review: The Necks / Paul G. Smyth Benedict Schlepper-Connolly
“Paul G. Smyth – who I have come to regard as Ireland’s darkest jewel – opened the concert with two solo piano improvisations. They formed perfect preludes: unlike the silky calm of the Necks, Smyth’s style is more troubled at the surface and is generally groove-less and a-rhythmic; but their undercurrents are unisonly serene. (That said, Smyth did send out an occasional beat and pseudo-melody, so uncharacteristic that each one was a revelation.)
… both made refreshingly clear that non-directional music such as this deserves our attention, especially in our modern, trajectorial culture. It goes nowhere and has nowhere to go, and that’s alright.”
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JMI
Volume 7, Number 1
Jan / Feb 2007
New Work Notes John McLachlan
“Paul G. Smyth’s ‘Descenders’ was a true example of the art of improvisation, using the most contemporary musical resources to produce something concentrated, absorbing and energizing.”
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The Wire
Issue 236, Oct 2003
The Compiler Clive Bell
“Congratulations to Irish pianist Paul Smyth, for creating the perfect track out of the 99 crammed onto Grain (Dotdotdot 003 CD). Marrying content admirably to form, Smyth flutters daydreaming fingers across the piano like a passing splash of sunshine and flickering shadow across a wall, for all of 54 seconds, which was exactly as much as I wanted to hear.”
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