ALLISON MILLER/CARMEN STAAF
Nearness
Sunnyside
Nearness is the follow-up to 2018’s Science Fair, the first dedicated pairing of pianist Carmen Staaf and drummer/percussionist Allison Miller. That set was a trio project, including bassist Matt Penman, with augmentation on select tracks by trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire and saxophonist Dayna Stephens. Nearness, by necessity and design (read: it was made during the pandemic), disposes of all but the two principals. That it feels no less full, and fulfilling, is a testament to the skill and inventiveness of Miller and Staaf, who have also worked together on violinist Jenny Scheinman’s Parlour Game and in other contexts.
Nearness gets its title from Hoagy Carmichael’s “The Nearness of You,” one of two covers on the 10-track set (the other is Monk’s “Ask Me Now”). The duo approaches the Carmichael track gingerly at first, Staaf laying out sprightly rhythmic patterns while Miller confines herself to a subdued click-clacking, nearly imperceptible at times. The listener’s preconceptions might lead one to expect her to open up at some later point in the song, as Staaf does. But Miller never takes the bait; only after the fact do you realize that she played it exactly how it needed to be played.
That level of intuition characterizes all of their arrangements. Of the five Staaf and three Miller compositions, none are misfires. Staaf’s melodicism and Miller’s sense of control make for an exciting, unexpected conversation. “Dan Dan,” the Miller-written opener, is of a more experimental, freeform nature, but again the two are in sync even at the trickiest twists and turns, and on tracks like Staaf’s “MLW” and “Birds,” the seeming randomness of some of their individual choices proves to be anything but, the pianist and drummer navigating their way through one passage after another as a single-minded unit.
—JEFF TAMARKIN
TYSHAWN SOREY
Mesmerism
Pi
To be mesmerized is to be hypnotized, which I’ve been when listening to the dense music of 42-year-old drummer/composer/academic Tyshawn Sorey. An astute and perhaps visionary musical thinker, Sorey once told me he enjoyed the music of Henry Mancini and Columbo television soundtracks as much as “serious” music. Having seen him blister improvisational music around Manhattan before taking his chair at Wesleyan, I nevertheless found Sorey’s earlier albums, including Oblique – I, Alloy, The Inner Spectrum of Variables, and Verisimilitude, a tough if enlightening journey. I always wanted to hear Sorey play on record as I’d heard him live.
That wish has been granted. Somewhat.
Joined by pianist Aaron Diehl and bassist Matt Brewer, the Sorey of Mesmerism is closer to the Sorey I remember: unvarnished, swinging, playful, his natural state one of turbulently original ideas, abrupt juxtapositions, surprising punctuations, and unerring sensitivity.
Horace Silver’s “Enchantment” finds Sorey banging half-time bell patterns, funky tom drops, and rambunctious snare-drum punches and rolls. His approach still includes a lot of space, as in “Detour Ahead” (Herb Ellis), for which the drummer deftly pitter-patters cymbals, evolving into full-set punctuations over an expanding performance. “Autumn Leaves” is pleasant. Paul Motian’s “From Time to Time” unfurls almost secretly (as does most of the album), followed by Muhal Richard Abrams’ “Two Over One.” It’s performed midtempo, thankfully, Diehl’s lovely cascades embellished with Sorey’s tonal beauty: shimmering cymbals, rich snare atmospheres, resonant kit work, truly orchestral drumming. The advance closes with Ellington’s “REM Blues,” a blues swinger, Sorey’s bubbly snare drum shuffling alongside Diehl’s lovely notes and Brewer’s insightful swing.
It’s still not Sorey with Dave Burrell at the Stone, but he’s showing a little more leg, and for that, we’re grateful.
—KEN MICALLEF
DOMi & JD BECK
NOT TiGHT
Blue Note
To the uninitiated, the cover photo of DOMi and JD Beck’s debut, NOT TiGHT, might simply reveal two more quirky Gen Z pop artists. Add the fact that keyboardist DOMi Louna and drummer Beck emerged through videos on YouTube, known more as a base for promoting boy bands rather than jazz, and the two might seem even more destined for 15 minutes of video-killed-the-radio-star fame. But luckily, music is still more about believing one’s ears than one’s eyes—even if, as is often the case with NOT TiGHT, listeners might not be able to believe what they’re hearing.
The minute-long “LOUNA’S iNTRO,” a classical motif with strings accentuating DOMi’s keyboards, leads to the duo track “WHATUP,” which exemplifies the duo’s YouTube wizardry. The French, Berklee-trained keyboardist’s two-handed attack and the Texas drum prodigy’s skittering figures on a minimalist kit conjure sounds of vintage Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea, Billy Cobham and Vinnie Colaiuta. The two principals share writing credits throughout the disc’s 15 brief tracks, intermittently with guests like bassist Thundercat, who lends a lead vocal to the dreamy, two-minute “BOWLiNG” (with DOMi singing harmonies) and a middle solo to the strutting title cut, on which the precision of DOMi’s left hand and Beck’s subdivisions give the illusion of programming.
Hancock guests on the co-written “MOON,” lending piano and vocoder to DOMi’s dancing figures and realistic left-hand bassline. Other cameos include Snoop Dogg, Busta Rhymes, and Anderson .Paak on the hip-hop-infused “PiLOT” and guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel on the appropriately titled chops fest “WHOA.” The open-minded duo itself is the highlight on the chanted “U DON’T HAVE TO ROB ME” and acidic “DUKE,” both restrained compositions that rely less on the flash that brought DOMi and Beck attention in the first place. All are proof that the possible future of jazz fusion might not look like it.
—BILL MEREDITH
KATALYST
JID013
Jazz Is Dead
Compared to the other outré jazz elders on Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad’s Jazz Is Dead label, Katalyst is a still a relatively fresh proposition: Inglewood, California-born in 2014. Each of the nine “Kats” is known for writing their own material, then stitching it together with the other members’ contributions to create an oblong soulful quilt, building on and feeding off the overall communal energy. It is this collective mentality that knits Katalyst to Jazz Is Dead’s brand. For the Kats’ approach is based on the local incubator tradition that came before them, namely the 1960s of Horace Tapscott’s Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra and Union of God’s Musicians Ascension Association. And if anything thrills Younge and Muhammad’s JID, it’s connecting the past—Los Angeles’ multiracial jazz past, in particular—to the present.
Drawing from its roots in free jazz, postbop, twinkly R&B, holy-rolling gospel, and hip-hop, with Younge and Muhammad providing atmospheric magic at the production helm, Katalyst shuffles peacefully and pastorally on tracks such as “The Avenues”—steered with a War-like cacophony courtesy of David Otis’ snake-charming tenor sax and Ahmad DuBose’s percussion—and “Daybreak.” The cool calm and warm surrender of “Summer Solstice” and “Corridors” is purposely broken by the weirdly willowy keyboards and herky-jerky rhythms of “Juneteenth,” a gently frantic yet stately song meant to recall all levels of Black struggle, hurt, joy, and sainthood. By the time JID013 closes with the Steely Dan-ish “Dogon Cypher” and the moody and aptly titled “Reflections,” the listener has an understanding of what it means to be part of the Katalyst brotherhood: one knotted by time together, melody, rhythm, and the causality of Californian collective consciousness.
—A.D. AMOROSI
JEREMY SISKIND
Songs of Rebirth
Outside In
Dozens of Ph.D. dissertations will be written examining music created during the first two years of COVID-19. I expect Jeremy Siskind’s will be cited often. A double album of 22 tracks, it’s a chamber-jazz meditation that unfolds like a day-by-day chronicle of the emotional and intellectual travails of life under lockdown, capturing the lethargy, despair, ruminations, and sheer weirdness of the pandemic experience. Featuring his long-standing trio with reed player Lucas Pino and vocalist Nancy Harms, can be absorbed comfortably
