Listening Booth, week 47: shorts: Magic Pocket

I don't write much about Norwegian jazz here. That's partly a conscious choice -- Norwegian jazz releases are well covered in mainstream media (I feel dirty using those words with Fox "News" in mind) media, which I was always trying to provide an alternative to -- but considering the bulk of those who visit these pages live abroad and may be curious about jazz from these shores, I'm making an exception today. Also, it's a damn fine record.

• Magic Pocket: The Katabatic Wind (Bolage) - Magic Pocket is a young-ish brass and drums quartet (all born between 1975 and '82) consisting of Erik Johanessen on trombone, Hayden Powell on trumpets, Daniel Herskedal on tuba, and Erik Nylander on drums, tabla machhines and drum machine. For this release, they're augmented by the electronics and piano of Morten Qvenild. The music here is atmospheric, drawn out melodic lines and sheets of sound underpinned by understated grooves. The tuba moves in and out of it's rhythmic "bass" role, the brass blends with the electronics, trickles of piano here and there without ever getting ambient territory. The bolero-esque "The Thar Desert" is particularly enchanting, while the bouncy "Darts" showcase their more playful side. Lovely stuff. 8*

* Grades are tentative, based on three or four listens, though quite often a few more. Much of the writing is done during listens, and should be considered notes rather than final reviews.

Listening Booth, week 47: Greg Ward's Phonic Juggernaut

• Greg Ward: Greg Ward's Phonic Juggernaut (Thirsty Ear) - Chicago born, now New York residing saxophonist and composer Greg Ward's credentials indicate that he's a man of varied tastes and that he's a musician willing and capable of handling several genres, from various strains of jazz, to Klezmer and classical music. I know him best from his collaborations with drummer Mike Reed. This is Ward's second album as a leader after 2010's Fitted Shards: South Side Story -- which I missed -- on 19-8 Records. Phonic Juggernaut is a sax-bass-drums trio record, and an enthralling one at that. The impressive opener "Above Ground" moves through several stages, starting off with Ward's blocks of intervals over the hectic yet forceful polyrhythms of drummer Damion Reid, into pockets of near calmness, and then back again. Much like the album as a whole. Reid's drumming, which reminds me a little bit of Ronald Shannon Jackson, provides much of the sonic freshness of this record. The drums are very much front and center, almost relentless, throughout, and especially so on the more heady pieces. And Phonic Juggernaut is fast paced at times, as the name would suggest, but combines that with the spacious and lyrical, such as on the lovely "Velvet Lounge Shut-In". Bassist Joe Sanders is the minimalist in the trio, relatively speaking, working off and in between Reid's busy rhythms and Ward's sharp and clear alto leaps with a mixture of insistent vamps and lyrical playing -- check his melodic interplay with Ward on the closing "Sectionate City". The bass is mixed unusually low and given little bottom, and although I miss its fullness and punch at times, the result works remarkably well within the sonic whole of the record. I'm hoping there's more to come from this trio, because there's clearly a unique musical chemistry between the three. 7*


Bonus: Listen to the title track, "Phonic Juggernaut", courtesy of Thirsty Ear Recordings on Soundcloud.



* Grades are tentative, based on three or four listens, though quite often a few more. Much of the writing is done during listens, and should be considered notes rather than final reviews.

Listening Booth, week 46, 2012: ASAP Rocky

• ASAP Rocky: LiveLoveA$AP (mixtape/selfreleased/liveloveasap.com) - This Harlem, New York native declares an affinity for Houston and doesn't want to be likened to a certain New Orleans rapper. Still, his slightly-behind-the-beat flow as well as the nasal timbre of his voice certainly has similarities with the Carter. The lyrical universe of LiveLoveA$ASP is filled with references to recreational drugs, reveling in it's effects. But it's the sonics of the record that really impresses. Delightfully produced, especially the tracks by Clams Casino and Beautiful Lou, it conjures up the sort of trippy soundscapes that Tricky once mastered so well - note in particular the laid-back groove and the sampled guitar lick of "Trilla", produced by Beautiful Lou. Additional color is provided by syrupy beats and rumbling bass (and hence the Houston love, I guess), Clams Casino's "Bass" a case in point. When the moods do get darker, they do so without succumbing to the techniques of horror core schlock, neither sonically or lyrically. No stoopid shock effects here. ASAP doesn't need such cheap tricks to be interesting. 8*

* Grades are tentative, based on three or four listens, though quite often a few more. Much of the writing is done during listens, and should be considered notes rather than final reviews.

Listening Booth, week 46, 2012: Taylor Ho Bynum Sextet

• Taylor Ho Bynum Sextet: Apparent Distance (Firehouse 12) - A four piece suite, originally commissioned through a New Jazz Works grant. The sextet consists of Ho Bynum on trumpet, Jim Hobbs (of Fully Celebrated "fame") on alto sax, Bill Lowe on bass trombone and tuba, Mary Halvorson on guitar, Ken Filiano on bass and Tomas Fujiwara on drums. Ho Bynum and Halvorson has played under the tutelage of Anthony Braxton, but there's not a whole lot of traces of him here, barring the odd twirling theme here and there. The obvious center piece of the album is the 20 minute long "Source", where Ho Bynum and Halvorson play interweaving melodic lines that Hobbs and Lowe eventually join in on and create their own paths out of, over Filiano and Fujiwara's funky and propulsive rhythms. The piece builds to a cacophonous crescendo during Hobbs' solo, and slides back into grove. There are a lot of interseting things going on here, with Hobbs in particular shining alongside Ho Bynum, while Halvorson often stays in the background for long sections, riffing with Filiano to help create dense grooves. 7*

* Grades are tentative, based on three or four listens, though quite often a few more. Much of the writing is done during listens, and should be considered notes rather than final reviews.