One of the seemingly endless number of recording projects launched by Guided by Voices leader Robert Pollard, ESP Ohio reunites him with one of his most distinguished collaborators, guitarist Doug Gillard. An Ohio native like Pollard, Gillard had played in the glam-influenced punk band Death of Samantha and the more pop-oriented side project Gem before he helped form the group Cobra Verde in 1992. In 1996, after Pollard reached an impasse with his Guided by Voices bandmates, he fired the rest of the band and hired Cobra Verde to serve as his GbV backing band for the 1997 album...