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Modern Jazz Quartet: Bluesology: The Atlantic Years 1956-1988
by Chris May
Asked to name the most insurrectionary artists associated with the Atlantic label, most jazz fans would probably think first of saxophonists John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman. Pianist John Lewis' Modern Jazz Quartet would come much further down the list. Yet in its own, more velvet manner, the MJQ was as radical as Coltrane and Coleman. When ...
Trio 3 + Geri Allen: At This Time
by Chris May
The publicity surrounding the release of At This Time is making much of the addition of a pianist to Trio 3's saxophone, bass and drums line-up. Arguably, however, the inclusion of a keyboard, played by Geri Allen, isn't the album's most significant feature. True, during the course of the group's 23-year history, most of its work ...
Colin Steele: Stramash
by Chris May
According to Scottish trumpeter Colin Steele's sleeve notes, a life-threatening quantity of whisky was consumed during the composing process for Stramash, an exuberant bacchanal of jazz and Scottish folk music. Steele took himself away to the island of Islay, off the west coast of Scotland, to focus on the writing and to embrace, frequently and enthusiastically, ...
Chico Freeman, Air, Walt Dickerson, George Cables: Buried Treasures Now On CD
by Chris May
Not to be confused with the Swedish trance and electronica label of the same name, the original Why Not label was an adventurous affair run by the Japanese businessman and jazz fan Masahiko Yuh for a brief but productive spell in the 1970s. With few contacts, but armed with an outstanding pair of ears, a cheque ...
Troyka: Troyka
by Chris May
London band Troyka--an energetic organ, guitar and drums trio--has collected a bundle of enthusiastic reviews for its live performances. The group has been tipped by some to become the next big thing on the British scene, a new Polar Bear or Portico Quartet for 2009, and expectations around the debut album have been high. In that ...
Alcazaba: Alcazaba
by Chris May
As Stan Laurel or Oliver Hardy famously said: “Another fine mess you got me into." A fine and wonderful mess, that is. Alcazaba is a London-based group of acoustic musicians who are exploring the mélange of styles which make up the Andalusian Gypsy music, flamenco. Spain's guitar music, India's folk and ritual music, and the Maghreb's, ...
Partisans: By Proxy
by Chris May
London band Partisans has been making the hair stand up on the back of audiences' necks with its supercharged collision of jazz and rock since 1996. By Proxy is the band's fourth album following the acclaimed Max (Babel, 2005), which was the most effective recreation of Partisans' ferocious live sound in the recording studio up to ...
Joachim Kuhn / Majid Bekkas / Ramon Lopez: Out Of The Desert
by Chris May
Boundary busting and inventive though it was, Kalimba (ACT, 2007)--the first album by German pianist Joachim Kuhn, Moroccan vocalist and guembri player Majid Bekkas, and Spanish drummer Ramon Lopez--ultimately felt like Kuhn's album more than a fully integrated, cross-cultural group exercise. Two years on, the trio's second outing, Out Of The Desert, offers a deeper mix--and ...
IDST: Seven Dials
by Chris May
As the youthful sextet IDST demonstrates, exciting developments in British jazz are not confined to London, nor do all British jazz musicians succumb to the lure of the capital (or not immediately anyway). IDST was formed in 2007 in the Yorkshire city of Leeds in northern England, where it continues to be based, and its players ...
Kairos 4tet: Kairos Moment
by Chris May
A luminous debut album from four young London musicians which, unexpectedly, affirms the eternal verities of acoustic jazz. Supple rhythms, strong melodies, inventive harmonies, flowing improvisation...it's all here and it bucks the trend. Since the adoption of Acoustic Ladyland by the mainstream media round about the release of the band's album Last Chance Disco (Babel, 2005), ...
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