REBECCA NASH - Peaceful King
Whirlwind WR4748
Nicholas Malcolm - trumpet; Thomas Seminar Ford - guitar/electronics; Rebecca Nash - piano/keys; Chris Mapp - bass/electronics;
Matt Fisher - drums; Sara Colman - vocals; Nick Walters - electronics
Rebecca Nash operates in a nebulously bounded territory that includes areas of the jazz mainstream but also includes intriguing connections to other areas of both improvised and composed contemporary music. As an educator with the National Youth Jazz Collective and Birmingham Conservatoire she’s thoroughly conversant with a style of modern harmonic composition with a distinctly European flavour: ‘Dreamer’ features a starkly beautiful trumpet and piano intro that evokes the carefully paced, harmonically sophisticated pairing of Kenny Wheeler and John Taylor, but the crediting of three band members with additional input on unspecified electronics indicates that her musical route maps lead to a host of different places. Opener ‘Peaceful King’ starts with the chiming rhodes and complex patterns of accents that you’d associate with post-Weather Report fusion, with Nick Malcolm’s trumpet melody painting pictures of spacious landscapes that are coloured in by layers of keyboards and effects. The rhythm section, who play together under the band name Stillefelt is tight and flexible; Matt Fisher’s power and precision on drums impress in counterpoint to Nash’s reflective, melodic solo. Nash is a versatile composer and shows herself to be adept at changing the focus, so that while ’Tumbleweed’ foregrounds Seminar Ford’s reverb-heavy guitar for more widescreen fusion vibes, Sara Colman’s vocals on ‘Hot Wired’ and ‘Grace’ bring us in closer for a more intimate, Joni-style experience. ‘Lokma’ shows the band’s mettle in some powerful jazz-rock improvisations and ‘Inishbofin’ adds fuzz bass to up the prog rock quotient before introducing some very jazzy trades between guitar and trumpet. The band, drawn from outside the London jazz nucleus, are tight and powerful throughout, with Malcolm impressing in particular. Exciting, muscular contemporary fusion.
Reviewed by Eddie Myer
Whirlwind WR4748
Nicholas Malcolm - trumpet; Thomas Seminar Ford - guitar/electronics; Rebecca Nash - piano/keys; Chris Mapp - bass/electronics;
Matt Fisher - drums; Sara Colman - vocals; Nick Walters - electronics
Rebecca Nash operates in a nebulously bounded territory that includes areas of the jazz mainstream but also includes intriguing connections to other areas of both improvised and composed contemporary music. As an educator with the National Youth Jazz Collective and Birmingham Conservatoire she’s thoroughly conversant with a style of modern harmonic composition with a distinctly European flavour: ‘Dreamer’ features a starkly beautiful trumpet and piano intro that evokes the carefully paced, harmonically sophisticated pairing of Kenny Wheeler and John Taylor, but the crediting of three band members with additional input on unspecified electronics indicates that her musical route maps lead to a host of different places. Opener ‘Peaceful King’ starts with the chiming rhodes and complex patterns of accents that you’d associate with post-Weather Report fusion, with Nick Malcolm’s trumpet melody painting pictures of spacious landscapes that are coloured in by layers of keyboards and effects. The rhythm section, who play together under the band name Stillefelt is tight and flexible; Matt Fisher’s power and precision on drums impress in counterpoint to Nash’s reflective, melodic solo. Nash is a versatile composer and shows herself to be adept at changing the focus, so that while ’Tumbleweed’ foregrounds Seminar Ford’s reverb-heavy guitar for more widescreen fusion vibes, Sara Colman’s vocals on ‘Hot Wired’ and ‘Grace’ bring us in closer for a more intimate, Joni-style experience. ‘Lokma’ shows the band’s mettle in some powerful jazz-rock improvisations and ‘Inishbofin’ adds fuzz bass to up the prog rock quotient before introducing some very jazzy trades between guitar and trumpet. The band, drawn from outside the London jazz nucleus, are tight and powerful throughout, with Malcolm impressing in particular. Exciting, muscular contemporary fusion.
Reviewed by Eddie Myer
