Daunik Lazro, Benjamin Duboc, Mathieu Bec: Standards Combustion

The French trio of saxophonist Daunik Lazro, bassist Benjamin Duboc, and drummer Mathieu Bec has released a collection of music with the fitting title Standards Combustion. Their covers of two compositions each by John Coltrane and Albert Ayler, and one each by Steve Lacy and Wayne Shorter do not so much burn down these nuggets as utilize them as a kind of touch-paper.

Sometimes listeners in the 21st century forget the chronology of music's development. This is especially true of free jazz. It did not just appear as manna from heaven. Lazro is fully aware of this evolution. Born in 1945, he was exposed to the changes happening in the US in the '60s and the contemporaneous European response. Standards Combustion is an homage to and acknowledgement of the above cited American musicians; but more than that, it is an electrifying gambol in these free jazz standards.

Coltrane's 1965 sessions produced "Vigil" and "Love." The first, a redux of the Coltrane and Elvin Jones duo, has Bec applying a parallel muscular attack which catapults Lazro's powerful tenor. "Love" is Duboc's turn to fuel the tenor, with Bec applying accented cymbal work. The sound is a reminder of the spiritual nature of its origins. The same can be said of the Ayler covers; Lazro delivers a full-throated rendition of both. "Mothers" finds Bec working a rolling pulse à la Sunny Murray, and "Ghosts" recreates the nursery rhyme which spawns Lazro's upper register prayer.

Although Lacy performed "Deadline" on soprano saxophone, Lazro's tenor saxophone does the composition justice, as he does on Shorter's "Nefertiti," a song which kick-started Miles Davis' second great quintet. The trio also plays one original, the gentle and sweet "Line Up For Lacy" by Lazro and two improvisations, "R.Métégal" and "Tight Rope." These announce the trio to be much more than a repertory band. Hopefully there will be more to come from Messrs. Lazro, Duboc, and Bec.