Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Lupa: Koki // Sketches of Trees

2

Lupa: Koki // Sketches of Trees

By

View read count
Lupa: Koki // Sketches of Trees
Lupa is a Latvian four-piece band. Their music fluctuates between funk, soul, electronic and jazz. In 2019 Lupa released their warmly welcomed debut album, Sequences and Consequences (Jersika Records, 2019). Koki // Sketches of Trees is the follow-up.

The album features eleven tracks with a heavy electronic influence. The band follows its debut aesthetic direction but with a more energetic, even slightly aggressive, attitude. While the use of keyboards and synths gives the Koki // Sketches of Trees a sturdy electronic taste, strong jazz influences are still on top.

Lupa blends the warm, well familiar vintage sounds of the Rhodes synth, vivid and melodic alto sax lines , and switches between cozy acoustic drumming and colder drum machine patterns. As well as this, electronic effects are used throughout the album, adding extra layers to this relatively dense soundscape.

The key figures in Lupa—Davis Jurka, Ritvars Garoza, Valters Sprudzs and Andris Buikis—are familiar with broad range of different musical styles. They step into the funk era with opening track "Osis // Ash" then turn to a pop music direction on "Akācija // Acacia," then go to drum 'n' bass on "Pīlādzis II // Rowan Ii." Koki // Sketches of Trees takes unexpected turns.

Compared to Sequences and Consequences, however, the new album lacks completeness. On a first hearing, the tracks are varied enough to be interesting—but unfortunately only for a while. It seems the quartet decided to put everything that came to mind into the album without prioritisation and filtering. Compositions sounds rather like a pool of sketches (ironically the word already inscribed in the album title), with reminisces from the previous decades.

Track Listing

Osis // Ash; Kastanis // Chestnut; Ozols // Oak; Egle // Fir; Pīlādzis I // Rowan I; Akācija // Acacia; Dižskābardis // Beech; Pīlādzis III // Rowan III; Kadiķis // Juniper; Ceriņi // Lilac; Pīlādzis II // Rowan II.

Personnel

Davis Jurka
saxophone, alto
Ritvars Garoza
keyboards
Additional Instrumentation

Davis Jurka: alto and tenor saxophones, flute, clarinett; Ritvars Garoza: keyboards and synths; Valters Sprudzs: bass; Andris Buikis: drums and analog drum machine.

Album information

Title: Koki // Sketches of Trees | Year Released: 2022 | Record Label: Jersika Records

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About 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 make 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.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves 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

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

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

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.