Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Carnival Skin: Carnival Skin

298

Carnival Skin: Carnival Skin

By

Sign in to view read count
Carnival Skin: Carnival Skin
Strong starts do not always ensure steady recording schedules. Jersey-based guitarist Bruce Eisenbeil experienced just such a surcease after a trio of laudable releases for CIMP. This new collective quintet recording on drummer Klaus Kugel's Nemu imprint puts him back in the record shop racks after a hiatus of several years. The band's name is something of a cipher. Its music is less cryptic—passionately concocted free jazz played with a strong, but never stolid, consensus of purpose.

Veteran bassist Hill Greene joins Kugel in providing the ensemble's engine. His stout strings, swollen by amplification, gird the sound floor like trunks of tall timber. Kugel is a mercurial stimulus behind his kit, deploying the same degree of focused energy he applied recently to the bands of saxophonist James Finn, whether by building walls of frothing rhythm or by easing back into a colorful accent mode. The front line of Perry Robinson and Peter Evans, the latter doubling on piccolo trumpet, an instrument new to me, further diversifies the proceedings. This is definitely a group were variance of experience and style work as core virtues.

Reflective of the shared leadership, the program includes a composition apiece from each player and concludes with the sharp-toothed collective improvisation of the title cut. Robinson's "Journey to the Strange weaves slivers of Ornette and Monk into a playfully spun free bop braid that runs from prickly and frayed to strenuously swinging. Eisenbeil fills the space between Evans and Robinson solos with one of his signature arpeggiated blizkriegs, bent smoking notes raining in droves. Evans' "Monster opens as a slowly loping blues only to erupt at periodic points with blasts of communal dissonance.

Greene's "Iono belongs to a improvisatory lineage that includes Coltrane's "Spiritual and Sonny Sharrock's "Many Mansions, a power dirge steeped in pathos-driven overtones. Eisenbeil again steals the spotlight, his jagged hammering blues chords echoing the sort of controlled chaos pioneered by Sharrock, while the others build a swirling funnel of sound that builds to a crescendoing climax. Kugel's "Bobosong and Eisenbeil's "Diagonal People progress through dynamic shifts that stretch from passages of somber quiet to flareups of explosive jangling catharsis.

It's unclear whether this group will be an ongoing outlet for these players' creative energies, but based on the merits of their union, future albums seem like requisite ventures. Either way, it's good to have Eisenbeil back on disc—though, as he'll probably be the first to admit, he never really left.

Track Listing

Journey to Strange; Monster; Iono; Bobosong; Diagonal People; Carnival Skin.

Personnel

Bruce Eisenbeil: guitar; Klaus Kugel: drums; Perry Robinson: clarinet; Peter Evans: trumpet, piccolo trumpet; Hillard Greene: double bass. (Recorded April 2005, NYC.)

Album information

Title: Carnival Skin | Year Released: 2006 | Record Label: NEMU Records

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.