Tiny Reviews edition!

Featuring:  Tiptons Sax Quartet & Drums Tiny Lower Case, Alien Ensemble Alien Ensemble, and Torbjörn Ömalm & Saajo Tih.

*****

The Tiptons Sax Quartet & Drums – Tiny Lower Case

There is a warmth and exuberance to Tiny Lower Case that is strongly reminiscent of traditional New Orleans jazz.  And while that’s not the style of the Tiptons Sax Quartet, their mix of Romanian, Klezmer, Soul, Jazz (and more) reflect the odd soup of influences that contributed to jazz in its earliest New Orleans forms.  Music that is catchy without ever getting saccharine, heart-on-the-sleeve evocative without ever becoming superficial.  Thick grooves are augmented by wildly careening solos, harmonies bolstered by tempos that bounce with life.  And capital-F fun.  Most especially fun.

Your album personnel:  Amy Denio (alto sax, clarinet, voice), Jessica Lurie (alto & tenor saxes, voice), Sue Orfield (tenor sax, voice), Tina Richerson (baritone sax, voice), Robert Kainar (drums, percussion), and guest: Peppe Voltarelli (vocals).

The album is Self-Produced.

Available at:  eMusic | Bandcamp | CDBaby | Amazon: CD – MP3

*****

Alien Ensemble – Alien Ensemble

The Alien Ensemble, an acoustic project from a member of electronica act Notwist, falls into territory originally scoped out by Todd Sickafoose’s Tiny Resistors… a place where modern jazz blends in neatly with indie-pop, chamber, post-rock, minimalism, folk, and really any other influence from any other genre that seems to fit at the time.  Arguably, that kind of thing isn’t really Jazz anymore, but new things are tough to categorize, more often defined by what they aren’t than what they are.  That’s this, here.  Their self-titled album Alien Ensemble is a mesmerizing blend of influences that presents a cohesive sound very easy to connect with.  Fans of Todd Sickafoose, the Ocular Concern, and Matt Ulery’s Loom should be paying attention here.

Your album personnel:  Micha Archer (trumpet, Indian harmonium), Karl-Ivar Refseth (vibes), Andi Haberl (drums), Mathias Gotz (trombone, harmonium), Stefan Schreiber (bass clarinet, sax), Olivier Roth (alto flute), and Benni Schafer (bass).

Released on Alien Transistor.

Available at:  eMusic | Amazon: CD – MP3 – Vinyl

*****

Torbjörn Ömalm & Saajo – Tih

Relaxing trio album from guitarist Torbjörn Ömalm, who also doubles on kantele.  Elements of jazz are fused with elements of Lapland, Swedish folk, and instead of some blend of influences, the songs sound like the genres are in a perpetual struggle over which will be the dominant force.  It lends peaceful music a very subtle, and very different, kind of tension.

Your album personnel:  Torbjörn Ömalm (guitar, kantele), Bo Söderberg (drums, percussion), Robert Erlandsson (upright bass), and guest: Henrik Rytiniemi (vocals).

Released on the F-IRE Collective.

Available at:  eMusic | Amazon: CD – MP3

*****

Some of these Tiny Reviews were used originally in the weekly new jazz releases column I write for eMusic, so here’s some language protecting their rights to the reprinted material as the one to hire me to write about new jazz arrivals to their site…

“New Arrivals Jazz Picks,” “New Arrivals Jazz Picks” & “New Arrivals Jazz Picks,“ reprints courtesy of eMusic.com, Inc.
© 2014  eMusic.com, Inc.

As always, my sincere thanks to eMusic for the gig.

At the heart of Sister Cities, the new release by The Ocular Concern, is the four-part suite which lends the album its name.  Sister Cities touches upon the theme of a modern world with increasingly fuzzier boundaries, with the quartet’s Portland, Oregon home as the glue that binds it up.  Of equal relevance is that the theme is analogous to the music itself.  Contemporary music of complex structures and infinite details, it lends itself to no one influence, except in fleeting moments.

There’s some voicing of the tango form on “The Island Milonga,” though approached more with the indie-rock flavor of Calexico than, say, a more traditional expression on recent releases by Latin Jazz artist Mark Weinstein’s Todo Corozon or Julio Botti’s Tango Nostalgias or even the innovative Line Kruse’s approach on Dancing on Air.  And the use of African mbira on the ephemeral “Ghost Town City Council” is eclipsed by the song’s opening indie-rock twang and its hard rock burly outro.  There’s also the chamber music opening to “Portland In Reverse” and how it intermittently cedes to the singular modern jazz influence of a Todd Sickafoose Tiny Resistors.

And that’s the jumping off point to what makes Sister Cities so damn successful.  Todd Sickafoose was one of the early innovators to this new style of contemporary music that calls Jazz home but travels to so many genres that home is simply wherever the ensemble briefly lays down its notes.  The key to moving in complex directions from genre to genre with a whirlwind of motion that it all seems to blend together is the quality of its melodies, and the way in which they are stamped onto the listener’s attention during the intro, the conclusion, and some well-timed spots in between.

Sister Cities is dotted with its shifting tides of influences and expressions, but it’s the album’s well-crafted, thoughtful, quirky melodic statements that makes this music supremely affable and an effortless listen.

Your album personnel:  Dan Duval (electric guitar, toy piano), Andrew Oliver (electric piano, percussion), Stephen Pancerev (drums), Lee Elderton (clarinet), Nathan Beck (vibraphone, mbira), and guests:  Erin Furbee (violin), Brian Quincey (viola), Justin Kagan (cello), and Alex Krebs (bandoneon).

Released on PJCE.

Jazz from the Portland, Oregon scene.

Available at:  Bandcamp | CDBaby | Amazon MP3