Book of Mae’bul (AUM Fidelity)
Darius Jones Quartet
Released April 12, 2012
NPR Music Jazz Critics Poll Best New Albums 2012
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About:
The third release / verse / character in Darius Jones’ on-going Man’ish Boy epic, Book of Mæ’bul (Another Kind of Sunrise) documented a next level in his estimable work as composer and bandleader. It was his first Quartet release, and once again featured a stunning new book of compositions written specifically for the project. The band consists of highly talented generational peers, each of whom give forth their finest in this group. Sublime melodies, purposefully juxtaposed meters, love, and beauty map the exquisitely detailed yet fluid movement of the music. Music that has been purposefully designed to embrace the listener.
Track Listing:
1. The Enjoli Moon 6:50
2. The Fagley Blues 5:43
3. Winkie 4:22
4. Be Patient With Me 7:38
5. My Baby 8:45
6. You Have Me Seeing Red 7:39
7. So Sad 8:00
8. Roosevelt 6:48
Personnel:
Darius Jones: alto saxophone
Matt Mitchell: piano
Trevor Dunn: bass
Ches Smith: drums
Recorded September 7, 2011, at System Two Studio, Brooklyn
Produced by Darius Jones & Steven Joerg
Recorded, Mixed and Mastered by Michael Marciano
Original cover art / paintings by Randal Wilcox
Review:
There is a sense of self-possession, if not gravitas that has marked Jones’ work since his auspicious 2008 debut Mannish Boy, the title of which gains increasing significance for both its suggestion of a maturity beyond his 33 summers as well as a deep tie to the muddy waters of the blues. Jones’ playing and composing may have some of the mercurial energy associated with the avant-garde but the communicative immediacy of African-American folk traditions stands like a bedrock in his work. This latest album is another impressive step forward because Jones gives further evidence of his composure, certainly on many of his solos where he wrings maximum melodic possibilities from an original theme, playing motifs that have a roaming, meandering character and a measured intensity. The dark weight of his tone and some of his more heated ascending lines have echoes of both Arthur Blythe and occasionally Oliver Lake, and like those two masters he also has his own way of synthesising elements of popular music and unusual, dot-dash chord progressions into songs of engaging originality. A great example is ‘Winkie’, which is a teasing, jaunty calypso whose swing is artfully disrupted by offbeat bass lines and mischievous scurries of high notes from pianist Matt Mitchell that make the harmony simultaneously fraught and frolicsome. The rhythm section proves itself to be a flexible one and in bassist Trevor Dunn and drummer Ches Smith, Jones has accompanists with the requisite lightness of touch – particularly Smith’s careful, almost hushed use of the ride cymbal – rather than insubstantial lightness. As good as the uptempo numbers are, Jones comes into his own on the laments such as ‘Be Patient With Me’ or ‘So Sad’ where he makes his tone swoon with both a grainy beauty and depth of emotion that could draw blood from a stone. Like all players that matter, Jones brings a lived-in, wizened quality to his performances, as if he knows something not just of black diasporan musical traditions but of the lives behind them.
Kevin le Gendre (Jazzwise)
