Matthieu Mazué: Turn of Events

In layman's terms, Turn of Events, French pianist Matthieu Mazué's 577 Records trio debut with fellow arsonists—Francisco Mela and trumpeter Diego Hedez—is a head rush. An old-fashioned, split-minute, play-by-play head rush that gives you a bit of vertigo at first. Which is really very cool and okay, because in this flood-the-zone environment, a bit of vertigo just might reveal an escape route: an off-ramp from the malaise of monotony we inhabit to an on-ramp of festival and wonder.

Without a bassist in sight, Turn of Events (3 songs, 45 minutes, 107.5MB) starts with the amorphous rondo "Fibule." Radiating an old school charm, Mazué, Mela, and Hedez, coercively known from here on in as the Mattieu Mazué Trio, bash and concuss, breaking down the walls between songs to "Mascarade." A sinister slither of a track, the trio hit all the right dark notes, thereby creating, if not the funeral march for a world on the brink, then its most formidable dirge. It is a pure thing of stunning resolve and absolute beauty.

The thirty-minute third song, "Revivements," is a head chart all its own. Un-genomed, the music tickles (starting at around 6:20) and pretty much takes its chances from there in real time. Hedez and Mazué troll and trill. Mela holds steady, but not too tight. Breaks free of the duo at around 10:35. Mazué, like a runaway tank, pushes his way back in around 11:20 or so. Hedez blows a reverie, and "Revivements" culls any and all existing restraints. Rhythm-rich and cut loose from all convention, Turn of Events  is, in another layman's term, muscle memory cranked to ten.