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Jamie Ruben: Groove-O-Ly-O-Scene
by Edward Blanco
With his debut album as leader, Canadian guitarist Jamie Ruben leads a quintet of Toronto's finest session and touring players in carving out a groove of relaxed and laidback light jazz on Groove-O-Ly-O-Scene. Inspired by the music of Medeski, Martin & Wood, The Bad Plus and the incomparable Frank Zappa, Ruben's music attempts a tasteful hybrid without Zappa's outlandish antics.Offering an all-original selection of music, the light grooves begin with “AQ Giraffe" and continue throughout the disc. Of ...
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by Florence Wetzel
Guitarist Jamie Ruben's Groove-O-Ly-O-Scene is an absolute treat for the ears. There's something deliciously mellow and laidback about this music, and at the risk of using a word that brings terror to many jazz fans, it is wonderfully smooth. Wait, don't stop reading! One dictionary defines “smooth" as “even and uninterrupted in flow or flight." That's exactly how this music rolls: it possesses a marvelously spacious ambience, woven through with fantastic grooves. In fact, “groove jazz" is the ...
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by David Rickert
As a guitarist, Jamie Ruben isn't a shredder; there are more notes in a Russell Malone solo than there are on Ruben's entire debut. Rather, Ruben excels at the slow burn--a few well-chosen notes and a keen melodic sense can be much more enjoyable than an exercise in finger-busting on the fret board. But first, a little background: after graduating from music school and spending time gigging in Ontario, Canada, Ruben headed to the Far East and spent ...
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by Douglas Payne
The musical path of Canadian guitarist Jamie Ruben is surely the story of the road less traveled. Rather than gigging regularly in some urban jazz hotbed, the Toronto-based guitarist made his living for seven years performing jazz full time in the Far East in such places as Katmandu, Bangkok, Shanghai and the even more remote regions of Siem Reap and Koh Samui, among others. Taking the musical sounds of the West over to the Far East ensured that ...
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by Hrayr Attarian
Canadian composer/guitarist Jamie Ruben's debut, Groove-O-Ly-O-Scene, is a very atmospheric affair, but its stylistic intricacies are not at the expense of substance. Although the opener, “AQ Giraffe," is short on improvisation, its almost Hawaiian-sounding heavy groove serves as a good introduction that sets the theme for the rest of the record. The lazy nocturnesque “Pennapa," on the other hand, has plenty of substance, with Ruben's Bill Frisell-like strumming contrasting well with trumpeter William Sperandei”s laidback, Freddie Hubbard-like sound. ...
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