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Monday, February 1. 2010Jazz Prospecting (CG #22, Part 10)Didn't finish Jazz Consumer Guide this week, but came close enough that I'm pretty certain this coming week will do it. Draft currently contains 31 graded records, 39 HMs or duds, 2517 words. About 1500 will make it into the column, with the rest left over. I have 10 graded A- records still without a review, but only a couple of those might make the cut, and maybe not that many. Lots of unwritten HM candidates. Most of what I'll be doing this coming week is re-playing them. I've decided that if I don't get a reasonably good one-liner after one play they'll go into the surplus file. Need to do a pretty severe cull anyway. The column will be full up with 2009 releases, many already on various year-end lists -- not least my own. Leftovers will be more of the same. I've only managed to grade 7 2010 releases thus far, while I have 85 in the pending queue. Also didn't get my kitchen done last week, but expect to do so this coming week. Very little left to do there. A little bit of jazz prospecting from the last two weeks. My main focus has been on writing up already-rated records, and cleaning out the replay queue. Willie Nelson revision is done -- more on that soon. Sonore: Call Before You Dig: Loft/Köln (2008 [2009], Okka Disk, 2CD): Sax trio, three guys famous for walking on the wild side, all the more dangerous together: Peter Brötzmann, Mats Gustafsson, Ken Vandermark. Two sets, one live, one studio. Impossible to deny that they bring interesting ideas into play, and after several records together they communicate readily, but the casual listener is going to hear mostly noise, and I find it rough going myself. B+(*) Mostly Other People Do the Killing: Forty Fort (2008-09 [2010], Hot Cup): Fourth album, third I've heard, led by Moppa Elliott, who takes the first notes on bass, just like Charles Mingus. Has the basic Mingus approach to horns, too, which is to put them on a roller coaster and let them run clean off the rails. Peter Evans does just that on trumpet, and Jon Irabagon's tenor as well as his alto sax defies gravity. Kevin Shea rounds out the quartet on drums, and gets a credit for electronics. Historical references are less obvious here than on the last two albums, although I might know more if only I could read "Leonard Featherweight"'s liner notes (tiny gray all-caps on a black background). I do recognize the cover art as influenced by Impulse! in the 1960s, but even that isn't obviously pegged to any one thing. They're coming out into their own. A- Opsvik & Jennings: A Dream I Used to Remember (2007-08 [2009], Loyal Label): That would be bassist Eivind Opsvik and guitarist Aaron Jennings. A publicist note pointed out that Opsvik has played with Paul Motian, Bill Frisell, and David Binney, but I associate him with A-list records by Kris Davis and Jostein Gulbrandsen. Also has three FSNT records, and a previous one with Jennings, Commuter Anthems (Rune Grammofon). Opsvik also plays keyboards, lap steel guitar, and percussion; Jennings strays past banjo to electronics, and both are credited with software and vocals. The vocals tend toward choral, which I don't find all that enticing. Otherwise, the interaction is intimate and intriguing. B+(*) Sharel Cassity: Relentless (2008 [2009], Jazz Legacy): Alto saxophonist, b. 1978 in Iowa City, IA, also plays soprano sax and flute. Second album. Solid mainstream group with Orrin Evans on piano, Dwayne Burno on bass, EJ Strickland on drums, and quite a few extra horns popping in and out -- Jeremy Pelt on trumpet, Thomas Barber on flugelhorn, Michael Dease on trombone, Andrew Boyarsky on tenor sax, Don Braden on alto flute. Slick and flashy postbop. B Prana Trio: The Singing Image of Fire (2008 [2010], Circavision): Brooklyn group, although it's not clear that Trio means a group with three members. The only real member is drummer Brian Adler, although vocalist Sunny Kim is most noticeable on 11 of 12 tracks, while piano (Carmen Staaf and Frank Carlberg), bass (Matt Aronoff and Nathan Goheen), and guitar (Robert Lanzetti) come and go. Kim sings poems by Kabir, Kukai, So Wal Kim, Hafiz, Anselm Hollo, Shankaracarya, Wang Wei, and Han-Shan. The vocals got on my nerves at first, but it actually settles down; may even be deeper than I'm inclined to credit. B+(*) Ben Wendel/Harish Raghavan/Nate Wood: Act (2009, Bju'ecords): Title all-caps on cover; spine only says "ACT" but front cover identifies the trio and their instruments: saxophone, bassoon, piano for Wendel; bass for Raghavan; drums for Wood. Not sure if my package matches the product: the print cover is pasted to a generic brown cardboard foldout wrapper, with a pasted print piece inside. On the other hand, nowhere is there "for promotional purposes only" print. I have less to say about the music, which is lean and articulate. B+(*) Rempis/Rosaly: Cyrillic (2009, 482 Music): Sax-drums duo, Chicago musicians, also play in the two-drummer Rempis Percussion Quartet. Dave Rempis is best known for his work in the Vandermark 5. He is fluid and forceful on alto, tenor, and baritone saxes, and Rosaly does a good job of playing off his energy. B+(***) Greg Reitan: Antibes (2008 [2010], Sunnyside): Pianist, second album, in a trio with Jack Daro on bass and Dean Koba on drums. Includes covers from Bill Evans, Denny Zeitlin, and Keith Jarrett, which should give you an idea. I'm impressed by both albums, but thus far don't have much to say. B+(**) Empty Cage Quartet: Gravity (2008 [2009], Clean Feed): Jason Mears (alto sax, clarinet), Kris Tiner (trumpet), Ivan Johnson (double bass), Paul Kikuchi (drums, percussion). Group has five albums together since 2006. Tiner's title piece consists of 11 sections, split up here into five chunks, separated by another four chunks of Mears's multi-sectional "Tzolkien." This stradles the notion of free and composed in attractive ways, although I'm hard-pressed to tell which is which or why it should matter. The two horns stand tall. The rhythm does a nice job of supporting them. B+(***) Andy Cotton: Last Stand at the Hayemeyer Ranch (2009, Bju'ecords): Bassist, plays guitar on one cut, grew up near Boston, studied at New School, based in Brooklyn, first album. Packaging a thin brown sleeve, looks biodegradeable. Gets lots of help, and the whole thing can be described as eclectic, but one relatively common theme is reggae -- "Shit Rock" is probably the best example, but there's also "Slow Reggie" and "C minor Reggie." Influences list starts with King Tubby; also includes "Appalachian fiddle music," which influences "Macallan's Waltz." Several cuts have vocalists, adding to the mish-mash feel even though there's nothing particularly wrong with any of them. B+(**) The Respect Sextet: Sirius Respect (2009, Mode/Avant): New York group, been together (give or take a few changes) since 2001. Several previous albums -- not sure how to count limited editions. Lineup: Eli Asher (trumpet), James Hirschfeld (trombone), Josh Rutner (tenor sax), Red Wierenga (piano), Malcolm Kirby (bass), Ted Poor (drums); most also play related instruments. Album subtitled "Play the music of Sun Ra & Stockhausen" -- presumably Karlheinz. I was briefly intrigued by Stockhausen a long time ago, but never got in very deep. His pieces here tend toward drones with a bit of classical overhang. Sun Ra, of course, is a lot more fun. B+(*) Out to Lunch: Melvin's Rockpile (2009 [2010], Accurate): New York group, led by David Levy (bass clarinet, alto sax, bansuri flute), presumably named for Eric Dolphy's legendary album. Septet, with three horns (Levy, Evan Smith on tenor sax, Josiah Woodson on trumpet) and a mostly plugged-in rhythm section (Eric Lane on keyboards, Matt Wigton on bass, Fred Kennedy on drums, and Kris Smith doing programming). Odd and interesting mix of free jazz and funk groove. B+(**) And these are final grades/notes on records I put back for further listening the first time around. Komeda Project: Requiem (2009, WM): Polish pianist Krzysztof Komeda (1931-69) certainly is a project. I've only sampled one of the dozen or so albums he has on obscure Polish labels -- now prohibitively expensive given exchange rate, I might add -- and it is really superb (Astigmatic). So this group -- led by expat Poles Krzysztof Medyna (tenor sax, soprano sax) and Andrzej Winnicki (piano), with expert NY help from Russ Johnson, Scott Colley, and Nasheet Waits -- is welcome, but I can't claim to have made any breakthroughs with it. B+(**) New Niks & Artvark Saxophone Quartet: Busy Busy Busy (2009, No Can Do): Drummer-led quartet with Fender Rhodes, guitar, and violin, but no bass, plays swanky postbop with some swing, mixed in with a sax section that can stand on its own. Has some awkward moments, but also marvelous ones when they loosen up. B+(**) Gerald Clayton: Two-Shade (2009, ArtistShare): Piano trio, debut recording, although he had the advantage of growing up in his father, bassist John Clayton's big band, and has a substantial list of side credits already. As with many mainstream piano trios, I'm at a loss for words, but he has good balance and poise, and this holds up consistently well. B+(***) Ben Allison: Think Free (2009, Palmetto): Subtler, in terms of melodies but also instrumentation, than his recent superb albums, but eventually they emerge with the precise good taste of someone assured in his thinking. Violinist Jenny Scheinman is central and critical -- her best showing since 12 Songs -- while Steve Cardenas' guitar and Shane Endsley's trumpet play off the edges. A- Donny McCaslin: Declaration (2009, Sunnyside): There are stretches here where the guitar fusion (Ben Monder) and/or the extra brass let you forget that the album is supposed to belong to the most technically gifted tenor saxophonist of his generation. That doesn't strike me as the right strategy. B+(*) Randy Brecker: Nostalgic Journey: Tykocin Jazz Suite/The Music of Wlodek Pawlik (2008 [2009], Summit): Bialystok's Podlasie Opera and Philharmonic play Pawlik's suite with unexpected flair -- you hear a lot of East European orchestras as jazz backdrops because they work cheap, but usually their classical breeding spoils the day. Helps no doubt that Pawlik's piano trio is featured, and especially that Brecker's trumpet is trusted with the highlights. He's always been a team player, but he's rarely had a team help him out so much. B+(***) For this cycle's collected Jazz Prospecting notes, look here. Unpacking: Found in the mail this week (or last):
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