Something Different

Guitarist Diego Barber burst onto the scene with the 2009 release Calima, an album with an expansive sound enveloped in a rustic serenity, courtesy of Barber’s use of classical guitar in a jazz setting.  He continued that sound with the 2011 release The Choice, an album that saw him move from the sounds of wide open spaces and into an environment in which his guitar work could display a tighter focus and sense of detail.

His evolution as musician takes another, much larger leap with his 2013 release 411, an album which sees him matching wits with the desktop wizardry of electronic artist Hugo Cipres.  Flush with electronic washes and dance hall grooves, Barber’s mix of classical and electric guitars takes turns meshing and contrasting with the prevailing digital environment.

Your album personnel:  Diego Barber (classical & electric guitars, bass), Hugo Cipres (desktop, effects), Seamus Blake (tenor sax, EWI), Johannes Weidenmueller (bass), and Ari Hoenig (drums).

Let’s cut right to the heart of the matter.  Third track “Poncho” illustrates the potential for genius this recording represents.  The rapid pulse of electronics coalesces with the susurrus of classical guitar and the gentle patter of drums.  It is a song that is both insistent and atmospheric, urgent and placid, contemporary and futuristic, and incorporates many divergent voices into one unique, encapsulating sound.  Right here is reason enough to demand a follow-up recording.

Other tracks incorporate these same elements, but with a varying degree of balance and with divergent methods of expressiveness.

In fact, much of this album eschews atmospheric potential for a willful groove.  “Walk!” has Barber on electric engaged in some funky repartee with saxophonist Blake.  Bassist Weidenmueller and drummer Hoenig instill a punctuated cadence that keeps things low to the ground without ever threatening to become an obstacle to free motion.

The electro-groove prevalent to so much of this album is an area developing with a greater insurgency in the last couple years.  The natural reference would be that of keyboarding Jason Lindner, who brings a similar touch to his own music, like that of Now vs. Now, as well as the recent release by Donny McCaslin, but the music of 411 also echoes that of electronica-percussionist savant Dosh.

The groove continues on “New York Citric,” with Hoenig setting the tone right from the start.  There occurs some atonal drift, the tune shedding its structure, incited primarily by the entrance of sax and electronics.  But Barber is a force of change on the song when he enters on classical guitar and gently lays a blanket of strings over the competing sounds, making them as one indistinguishable whole.

The remainder of the tracks take on the personality of album-opener “Timanfaya,” a tune that is heavy with the percussion driven tempo and thick electronic washes.  Cipres dishes out the effects with some wise timing… an ethereal presence of “Timanfaya” sets the tone for the album, and on “All In,” the electronic squiggles match well with Weidenmueller’s commanding, furtive bass phrases, whereas on “East Side Story,” Cipres takes on the role of accompaniment to the electronic squirming of Blake’s EWI.

And, admittedly, while I do miss the wide-open sound of Barber’s debut Calima, I’m absolutely thrilled to hear him take chances with creative leaps such as 411.  I want musicians to record music that I enjoy listening to, but even more, I want them to display creative vision and take big risks to follow those visions… because that’s the kind of inspiration that incites all kinds of imaginative responses in a listener.  That is the kind of thing that can’t be overvalued.  Barber and Cipres score bonus points for taking a stab at that kind of result.

Released on Origin Arts.

Download a free album track at AllAboutJazz, courtesy of the artist and label.

Available at:  eMusic | Amazon CD & MP3

*****

You can read my review of Barber’s 2011 release The Choice, HERE, on this site.  I’ve never gotten around the reviewing Calima, but you should just go pick it up, because it’s wonderful.

Ronald’s Rhythm, the debut recording of drummer RJ Miller, is one of an emerging approach to fusing jazz with minimalist ambient electronica.  Not quite jazz, not quite pop, not quite minimalist, Miller’s set of dense meditative lullabies don’t obliterate the walls between genres so much as dematerialize them into obsolescence.

The result is an album of exquisite tranquility that brings a tiny heat, like an ember that burns brightly with no end.

Your album personnel:  RJ Miller (drums, keyboards, analog synthesizers) and guests: Pete Rende (analog synthesizers, organ), Adam Chilenski (bass), Liz Kozak (piano, analog synthesizer), and Leo Genovese (accordion).

And while this album is flush with modernity, it also echoes music of the past.  It would be impossible to listen to this album and not see how Miller is connecting the dots between jazz and the ambient experimentalism of Brian Eno.  “3:05 am” swims with that odd melancholia associated with Eno’s most ambient work… that mix of inspired beauty and sad reflection, as if watching the snow fall on a full moon’s eve… the glittering snow flakes, the warm lights pouring from a window and out over fallen snow… a time for peacefulness and self-reflection.

But Eno isn’t the only emergent influence to reveal itself here.  The early 1970s saw Alice Coltrane transform her raw spiritual jazz sound into something quite new… drowned in electronic washes, her spiritual treatises gained an extra charge of liveliness and expressiveness.  The title-track “Ronald’s Rhythm” hits similar territory… percussion that swings, but a spirituality that drifts and gives the song an ethereal presence.  Uptempo, yet with an inimitable hypnotic effect.

And though many of the tracks proceed with a measured equanimity, like album opener “Sunny Cover,” there are those like “Downstairs” which present an insistent rhythm that becomes increasingly textured in combination with becoming increasingly volatile.

Miller composed the album in the remote location of Blue Hill, Maine, choosing to record a project with drums and keyboards as the center of gravity.  He brings in a handful of guests who add their own keyboard and synthesizer contributions to the songs with some bass, piano, and accordion in choice spots.  The danger in a rotating cast of personnel is incongruity between album songs, shattering coherency.  Admirably, the different musicians and their varied contributions all fall neatly into place, becoming a seamless part of the composite whole.

Just a beautiful album… one that envelops the listener slowly, with the unhurried grace of a rising sun slowly blanketing the land with light and warmth.

Released on the Loyal Label.

Download a free album track, courtesy of the artist and label, by hitting the “Download” button at the bottom of the audio player embedded above.

Music from the Blue Hills, Maine scene and NYC.

The album will be available on November 5th, 2013.

Available at: eMusic MP3 | Amazon MP3 | At the Loyal Label site

*****

What Else You Should Know:

RJ Miller performs on some of saxophonist Jeremy Udden‘s recordings.  These are albums I highly recommend.  Check out my site for reviews.  Here’s a place to start.

Also, many of the albums released on Eivind Opsvik’s Loyal Label could fall under my Something Different category.  Nothing about the music they put out is ordinary, and pretty much all of it is unclassifiable.  Start searching my site HERE.

Also, another nifty example of the fusion of jazz and ambient minimalism would be Goran Kajfes‘ X/Y, which you can read about HERE and HERE.