Nov 21 2013
The Dickens Campaign – “Oh Lovely Appearance”
Inspired by the work of folklorist Alan Lomax… an archivist who documented American folk music found along its many trails and towns… drummer Deric Dickens sought to discover his own voicing of the songs that constitute a large part of the creative wellspring of this country, marking it like the rings of an hundred-year-old redwood.
Of the ten tracks that comprise Oh Lovely Appearance, four of the songs come directly from the Lomax collection, rearranged by Dickens to suit the session’s trio format. Of the remaining six tracks, they are cut from the same cloth as the archived tunes, and the trio wears them with the same sense of age and tradition.
The trio, going by the name of The Dickens Campaign, consists of Deric Dickens (drums), Kirk Knuffke (cornet), and Jesse Lewis (guitar). On this charming album of embraceable melodies and conversational rhythmic chatter, it is easy to overlook how seamlessly they coalesce as a unit. When measuring the quality of a unit’s teamwork in making the music come together, sometimes it’s viewed by way of the interplay between musicians and how conversant they are in their back-and-forth interactions. Other times, it’s a matter of direction and movement… do the musicians create patterns of sound and motion that elevate the music to a new plateau or is it just a sonic logjam of competing traits? And then, on an album like this, that teamwork is best measured in the way that each member’s individual sound fuses with the others, coming together in a way that no longer is it the three sounds of a trio, but one singular sound with three simultaneous voices. This particular form of interplay makes for a heady concoction, giving the music a presence both potent and dense with sonic qualities.
Interestingly, while the compositions Dickens chose to cover date far far back, it is easy to hear the reflection of those songs in the modern music of today. The back porch languor of saxophonist Jeremy Udden’s Plainville recordings echoes in the rendition of Hazel Hudson’s “As I Went Out For A Ramble,” a song with talkative drums, a cornet seeking to tell a story, and a guitar that wants to hum along to both. A cheerful song that sighs contentedly.
And then there’s the rendition of Henry Truvillion’s “Roustabout Holler,” a song with a confident gait and an itch to rock out a little bit. And when the trio indulges that particular impulse, they emit some Neil Young grind & twang, a sound that flashes teeth like steel but maintains a neighborly amicability that keeps things friendly between instrument and ear.
The Kirk Knuffke original “Poem” is not unlike the Americana Jazz sound of Bill Frisell, one of the true innovators in the jazz-folk music subgenre. The murmurs of notes, the comforting patter of drums, the lonely calls of cornet… like a nighttime forest scene, of sounds of unease drifting out from the darkness of the woods, as moonlight shines down on the fields and the stars twinkle and shine in an unblemished sky.
That tone and temper continues on the trio’s rendition of Mr. & Mrs. Boyd Hoskins’ “Oh Lovely Appearance of Death” and the Dickens original “I Should Have Known.” Whereas the former track adopts a melancholy disposition, the latter is declarative, like a suitor professing his love via song.
Most tracks keep things closer to the peaceable end of the spectrum, but a couple, like the Knuffke original “Twice My Heavy” bring a heat that could forge metal, and a lumbering gait that could stamp that metal into place. And the previously mentioned “I Should Have Known” develops into something louder, with Lewis’s electric guitar leading the way and rousing the trio to raise their voices high and heavy.
But for the most part, the songs range closer to the quieter side of town, exemplified best by the Dickens original “Paul Motian,” a tribute to the recently passed jazz great. It’s a song that accentuates the Motian approach of presence over form, finesse as its own show of strength. Knuffke, as he does throughout this fine album, instills a tranquility across the songs, letting notes soar with an almost casual nature, as if buffeted by the sounds of the other trio members as would a bird simply riding the currents of the breeze with a grand majesty.
But these are songs of the soil, not the air, and the trio’s rendition of William Walker’s “Hallelujah” has a tunefulness that speaks of old songs and the happy sense of comfort at being a part of that lineage, of becoming a part of the music timeline that connects us all. Music brings us all together. Art does that. Creativity. This is just one more example of the varied ways this connectedness may occur.
Just a real charming and likable album.
Released on Mole-Tree Music.
Jazz from the Brooklyn scene.
Available at: Bandcamp | CDBaby | eMusic | Amazon MP3
*****
Other Things You Should Know:
I reviewed Deric Dickens debut album Speed Date, which includes a contribution by Kirk Knuffke. You can read it, here, by following this LINK.
Also, Dickens contributed a photo to my Work Space Tumblr page, HERE.
Follow this LINK to a nice podcast about Alan Lomax on the NPR site. And follow this LINK to the Lomax collection on the Library of Congress website.
Dec 9 2013
Recommended: John Zorn – “The Mysteries”
Stunningly beautiful follow-up for the trio of Bill Frisell, Carol Emanuel, and Kenny Wollesen, on the heels of 2012’s The Gnostic Preludes. Performing the compositions of John Zorn, who, with his mystics series, attempts to wed spiritual music of the past with modern approaches, the trio offers up rich, simple melodies upon a foundation of dynamic, vibrant rhythms. 2013’s The Mysteries doesn’t differ dramatically from its predecessor, but there is a subtle shift in the complexity of the music’s motion… the newest offering possessing a greater intricacy of activity, of rhythms within rhythms, and thus a greater tableau across which the trio intersperses fragments of succinct melodic expressions.
Ultimately, this results in an album imminently more engrossing, in which the presentation of additional facets blurs the lines between song and dance, between melody and motion.
Your album personnel: Bill Frisell (guitar, effects), Carol Emanuel (harp), and Kenny Wollesen (vibes, bells). All compositions by John Zorn.
Opening track “Sacred Oracle” has Frisell skipping across Wollesen’s stream of melodic lines. Emanuel slips in and adds a complementary line on harp, first as partners to Wollesen’s vibes, then in tandem with Frisell’s flight pattern.
“Hymn of the Naasennes” takes a more straight-forward approach, with all three members moving at the same speed, contributing differing motions to the same cadence, endowed with the enveloping tranquility of a skipping stone gliding over choppy waves.
“Dance of Sappho” moves with a different motion, of tight circles orbiting a song center that rotates in the opposite direction. The trio’s different parts mesh into a kaleidoscopic high-speed melodic revelation, its gentle features punctuated by sharp rings of bells.
“The Bachanalia” has Frisell bringing a ghostly twang and his blurring of melody with effects to create a strange crosshatch with Emanuel’s sunny notes on harp… a match made further complex by the rhythmic cross-currents seeming, at first, quite dissimilar until a wider view shows them flowing into the same confluence. Wollesen’s bells are like the resonant sound of buoys out on the water’s surface.
“Consolamentum” illustrates the lovely way Frisell is able to take flight with melody from a head-start of rhythmic dynamism. He takes shuffling steps with his notes at odd intervals, building a cadence that doesn’t, immediately, sound fluid or indicate a motion gaining speed, and yet, the pattern emerges, one that displays an almost loping momentum… and from there, he takes off.
“Ode to the Cathars” begins with Frisell’s use of effects and loops, instilling a moody ambiance that borders on spooky. But this dwindles away, and after a few steps down his guitar’s bass string, the trio jumps off into a deeply melodic tune. Frisell throws in a few pings and whirrs of effects, but Wollesen’s deeply affecting run on vibes immerses the trio in warmth. Even when Frisell turns up the heat on guitar, an intensity matched by Emanuel’s harp, it’s the underpinning of vibes that maintains a steady course that sees the song to its end.
“Apollo” takes on darker tones. Melodic lines are cut short, interspersed with silences, occasionally flipped over to the dissonant side of the pillow, creating an uneasy tension that contrasts nicely with the comforting fluidity of most other album tracks. Here, Frisell lets little effects bubble to the surface.
“Yaldaboath” is a fully immersive track, with all three artists creating a sonic wave that spreads out like an ocean enveloping the entirety of a shore line.
The album finishes strong with “The Nymphs,” a composition that accretes intensity with the thoughtful purposefulness of a skyscraper constructed slowly upward to the clouds. Though presented with a rapid pace, Wollesen’s vibes have a timeless quality that accentuates the idea of motion and much as the quality of stillness. Frisell takes quick leaps and hops across the surface of the vibes’ rhythm, but with a grace that belies its rate of speed. Emanuel bridges the gap between the two, sometimes matching Wollesen’s percussive energy, sometimes synching up with Frisell’s intervallic expressions of melody.
An album of mesmerizing beauty.
Released on the Tzadik label.
Available at: Amazon CD | Amazon MP3
You can also buy the CD directly from Tzadik, and the price is actually better than Amazon’s. Plus, it’s always better to buy directly from the artist/label.
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By davesumner • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2013 Releases • 0