Review: Adrian Holovaty’s ‘Layer Cake’ Is an Irresistibly Joyful Acoustic Confection

Within seconds of starting this self-released EP (available at Bandcamp and holovaty.com), there’s a smile on my face—and before the end of the first minute, I’m grinning ear to ear, shaking my head, and asking: How does Adrian Holovaty bake so much sweetness into a two-and-a-half-minute instrumental?

Well, to start, there’s a bottom layer of la pompe manouche, the foundational rhythm of Gypsy jazz, dampened to produce the lightest, simplest bit of propulsion. On these tracks, Holovaty plays the same part twice—once with a pick on a 2016 Bob Holo Traditional, and once with his fingertips on a borrowed 2010 Martin 000-15M. From there, the rhythm tracks are stacked for maximum boom-chick, blending Holovaty’s complementary tones of spruce and mahogany with the warm, rich sounds of Arnoud van den Berg’s upright bass—and carefully set aside to leave room for everything else.

Adrian Holovaty, Layer Cake (Self-released)Next, Holovaty—an Amsterdam-based web designer best known as the creator of the web-based transcription tool Soundslice—adds melody and variations in layer after layer of acoustic guitar, sometimes as many as a dozen tracks, recorded and re-recorded in his home studio. The titles can be as breezy as “Sky Cruiser” or “The Guarded Smile,” and taken one at a time, some of the guitar parts are simple enough—even when played twice. But others grow increasingly intricate, adding unlikely chord changes as they dance around melody and harmony. As the tracks are gently placed one atop the other, all the notes ring clear and sweet.

The more layers Holovaty adds, the lighter these instrumentals grow—and by the time he’s done, the combinations are irresistibly joyful, no matter how complex the architecture. Drawing from country, pop, and swing, they’re tunes that flow beautifully, full of snap and crackle. And despite a track called “Love and Candy,” there’s nothing here that’s sugary. At all. The sweetness comes honestly, through the joyful, self-absorbed pleasure of constructing something lovely, shimmering, and perfectly full of pleasure.