Sep 11 2018
Recommended: Montagne! Trio – “Entre les Murs”
If I were to make a bullet point list of the qualities to the Montagne! Trio‘s Entre les Murs, it would lead you to expect that this is a tasteful, restrained piano trio, perhaps not unlike one of Brad Mehldau’s more laid-back recordings.
- Direct melodic fragments that unfold into lovely harmonic dimensions
- Introspective reveries that elicit daydream imagery
- A tight rhythmic approach that underpins melodies with a low center of gravity.
- Pairs well with rain falling outside an open window
But the album doesn’t really play out that way. The opening track gives that impression, but from there, the trio of bassist Jules Martinet, pianist Daniel Roelli and drummer Clément Grin instigate a number of diversionary tactics to keep things interesting. There’s the staggered changes of direction that defy an implied trajectory. Bursts of dissonance emerge unexpectedly, and the trio’s seamless adoption of the disruption makes it seem natural and ongoing… until the peacefulness returns. And then there’s the slight disturbances, like tiny splashes upon the surface of a placid lake, where the motion of the ripples seems to linger even after a certain stillness resumes.
And, strangely, it’s still easy enough to walk away with the impression that you got that Mehldau type of experience anyway.
Your album personnel: Jules Martinet (upright bass), Daniel Roelli (piano), Clément Grin (drums) and guest: Leo Fumagalli (tenor saxophone).
The album is Self-Produced.
Listen to more of the album at the artist’s Bandcamp page.
Music from Lausanne, Switzerland.
Available at: Bandcamp
As I dig through the jazz new releases listings on Bandcamp, it’ll sometimes occur that I flag a page for further investigation at some later date. Something about it gives an indication that there’s more to the story than just the album for sale. When you go through as many of these pages as I do, you attain a second sense for this kind of thing. One such example comes courtesy of Haruka Kikuchi.
Sep 13 2018
I like how the Bedmakers strip down a folk song
Saxophonist Robin Fincker, violinist Mathieu Werchowski, bassist Pascal Niggenkemper and drummer Fabien Discombs take variations on tunes by John Fahey, Bert Jansch, and traditional works from Scotland and Ireland, and turn them into something strangely familiar and yet profoundly new. The saying is that everyone has a twin; applied to the album Tribute To An Imaginary Folk Band, the twins of the original compositions are aliens visiting from a planet very far away. Waves of dissonance come crashing down on fragments of the original melodies, and they remain out of sight until long divergences run their course. Sweetly fond reminiscences upon the spirit of songs will suddenly metamorphose into beastly abnormalities that, oddly, retain a trace of their essential tunefulness. And no less compelling are those passages when the foot-tapping characteristics of the original work are ratcheted up, but with a groove rather than via a catch melody.
The quartet takes their name from a John Fahey song title, and their music also adopts the spirit of his creative arc. In that same way Fahey began to incorporate other folk music influences into his American blues and, later, veered into avant-garde territories, the Bedmakers exhibit that same attitude of boundless wandering… even if it’s just to circle back to where they started and begin a new beginning.
A very fun and exciting album.
Your album personnel: Robin Fincker (tenor sax, clarinet), Mathieu Werchowski (violin), Pascal Niggenkemper (double bass) and Fabien Duscombs (drums).
Released on the Freddy Morezon label.
Listen to more of the album on the label’s Bandcamp page.
Available at: Bandcamp
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By davesumner • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2018 • 1 • Tags: Bedmakers, Fabien Duscombs, Freddy Morezon, Mathieu Werchowski, Pascal Niggenkemper, Robin Fincker