Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Neil Cowley Trio: Radio Silence

145

Neil Cowley Trio: Radio Silence

By

Sign in to view read count
Track review of "Vice Skating"

Neil Cowley Trio: Radio Silence
With this British trio's third album—and perhaps its finest hour to date—a heartwarming assault on the customary jazz piano trio format surges onward. Here, pianist Neil Cowley merges rock, pop sentiment and mainstream jazz into a stylistic enterprise, aided by a highly rhythmic undercurrent. Cowley injects a sense of antiquity into the program, via his slightly rustic sounding piano, shaded with a honky-tonk, full-bodied tone. It's an uncanny dimension that casts an earthy keynote into the grand schema, while enhancing the more ethereal spots and cross-theme intersections.

With cascading block chords and memorable choruses, the pianist ventures into a lush, romantic domain with a twist or two on "Vice Skating." The band's youthful presence and cunning designs invert standard piano trio fare with off-kilter detours, false endings and pulsating unison lines that pose alternating viewpoints.

Cowley's rolling chord clusters and the trio's pumping rock beats add oomph to a lush melody, but it's an arrangement that translucently fuses positive sensibilities with pure power, fluency and tender notes, as a series of odd-metered pauses and regenerations of the primary theme help spawn a tension-and-release environment.

"Vice Skating" is a remarkably coherent composition that offers a comprehensive glimpse into the trio's novel convictions. Paralleling the likes of The Bad Plus and Medeski Martin & Wood, the Neil Cowley Trio works within a mode that harmoniously turns the tide on convention. .

Track Listing

Monoface; Radio Silence; Vice Skating; A French Lesson; Gerald; Desert To Rabat; Stereoface; Hug The Greyhound; Portal.

Personnel

Neil Cowley: piano; Richard Sadler: bass; Evan Jenkins: drums.

Album information

Title: Radio Silence | Year Released: 2011 | Record Label: Naim Label

Comments

Tags


For the Love of Jazz
Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who create it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

You Can Help
To expand our coverage even further and develop new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for a modest $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination will vastly improve your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Love Is Passing Thru
Roberto Magris
Candid
Sunny Five
Inside Colours Live
Julie Sassoon

Popular

Eagle's Point
Chris Potter
Light Streams
John Donegan - The Irish Sextet

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.