The album exudes a sense of confidence and charisma but also swaggers with the calm assurance that each note, each beat is exactly right in its place.
Edition: EDN1219
Donny McCaslin: tenor saxophone, flutes; Mark Guiliana: drums; Tim Lefebvre: bass; Jason Linder: synths, Wurlitzer; Chris Bullock: Bass Flute; Jannek Zechner: additional Keyboard; String Quartet – Sara Caswell: Violin; Joyce Hammann: Violin; Lois Martin: Viola; Jody Redhage Ferber: ‘Cello.
Recorded by Pete Min at Lucy’s Meat Market
I’ve been a fan of McCaslin either side of his adventure with Bowie (I recommend his ‘Perpetual Motion’ album for anyone who missed it) and really enjoyed his sizzling set at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival a few years back. So, it is with some confidence that I say this is the album that McCaslin and his band have been destined to make.
The album exudes a sense of confidence and charisma but also swaggers with the calm assurance that each note, each beat is exactly right in its place.
The layered saxophones on the opening track, ‘Stria’, ‘Hold me tight’, track 3, or ‘Body blow’, track 4, capture some of the vibrancy of McCaslin’s live playing and add lustre to his carefully constructed melodic lines.
The rhythms shift across the various suburbs of New York, with the spacy dub of ‘Fly my spaceship’, track 2, the rockier ‘Body blow, track 4, to the electro-funk of ‘Turbo’, track 6, and the title track, to the two-step of ‘Landsdown’, track 7, you’re taking on a musical journey by genial hosts who are keen to take you off the beaten track through lesser known avenues and into sun-drenched squares.
Across their previous albums, the band have been developing a sound that takes the adventurous spirit and complicated rhythms of bebop and blends this with contemporary electronic beats and effects to create a sound that is instantly recognisable as their own.
After a breathless opening four tracks, ‘Big screen’, track 5, is a ballad in which the saxophone unspools an hypnotic loop of melody over washes of electronica and strings. Here, and on ‘Landsdown’, track 7, the use of strings not only broadens the sound but also creates opportunities for McCaslin to further refine his compositional talent.
The structure of the string arrangements echo that of the ways in which electronic effects permeate other tracks, but the human playing creates a passion that adds depth to the music.
I’m sure that this review will be one of many which extol the virtues of the band, celebrate the beauty of the album, and place this squarely at the top of this year’s best releases. In case I haven’t been clear enough, this is a wonderful record.
