The way that a sunbeam paints a thick streak of light across the room, with a sharp, controlled explosion upon the window pane and unfurling a blanket of warmth across the floor, that’s how trumpeter Jon Crowley paints melodies upon the surface of songs. It has the presence of something tangible, something that can be grasped and bottled up, and it has the same power to captivate and lock in place both time and tranquility like that thick afternoon sunbeam blanketing the room in serenity. It’s a talent that Crowley continues to display on his newest release I Walk Amongst the Humans.
And where with previous releases, like 2011’s At the Edge, Crowley added an indie-rock influence as melodic subtext, on his newest, it’s full-on dramatics… a helpful reminder that sometimes sunlight can burn. The exactness of the surges of intensity provides some outstanding builds and sudden drops back to a state of calm, as on “Other Lives” or “A Little Poison” where, instead, the intensity comes to a resting place in a state of chipper tunefulness. And then there’s those times when Crowley sets it to smolder fiercely on “In Dreams” and “On a Park Bench.”
But no matter the form each song assumes in the end, it’s always accompanied by those rays of sunlight melodies. Beautiful music even when flashing some edge.
Your album personnel: Jon Crowley (trumpet), John Beaty (alto sax), Noah Berman (electric guitar, effects), Brad Whiteley (piano, Fender Rhodes), Ben Thomas (upright bass) and Max Maples (drums).
Released on Destiny Records.
Listen to more of the album on the label’s Bandcamp page.
Available at: Bandcamp | Amazon
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Sep 17 2016
Recommended: Jon Crowley – “I Walk Amongst the Humans”
And where with previous releases, like 2011’s At the Edge, Crowley added an indie-rock influence as melodic subtext, on his newest, it’s full-on dramatics… a helpful reminder that sometimes sunlight can burn. The exactness of the surges of intensity provides some outstanding builds and sudden drops back to a state of calm, as on “Other Lives” or “A Little Poison” where, instead, the intensity comes to a resting place in a state of chipper tunefulness. And then there’s those times when Crowley sets it to smolder fiercely on “In Dreams” and “On a Park Bench.”
But no matter the form each song assumes in the end, it’s always accompanied by those rays of sunlight melodies. Beautiful music even when flashing some edge.
Your album personnel: Jon Crowley (trumpet), John Beaty (alto sax), Noah Berman (electric guitar, effects), Brad Whiteley (piano, Fender Rhodes), Ben Thomas (upright bass) and Max Maples (drums).
Released on Destiny Records.
Listen to more of the album on the label’s Bandcamp page.
Available at: Bandcamp | Amazon
Like this:
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By davesumner • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2016 releases • 0