Space punks splendor pack4/11/2023 This group does an outstanding job of maintaining clarity through the most intricate of passages. In addition to Alexa and the Tokyo-born Ess, the ensemble features drummer Clarence Penn, pianist Manuel Valera and bassist Yasushi Nakamura. Among the album’s more fervent pieces are “Out Of The Ashes,” a potent distillation of modern jazz themes, and “Torii,” a vibrating engine of prog-rock energy. Those polar forces are in constant play throughout the program. The result is music of a heartfelt and spiritual sort, with songs that feel as imbued with passion as they are guided by intellect. Whatever the case, it’s a solemn pairing used to masterful effect by guitarist Gene Ess on his latest album, Absurdist Theater, which features gifted vocalist Thana Alexa. Perhaps it’s the similarity in timbre that so pleases the ear, or maybe it’s that the instruments share a close association in the history of music. Tonally, there’s an arresting beauty to the combination of wordless vocals and guitar. And, like much of this album, the song is a testament to the notion of saying a lot by speaking a little. “Whiskey For Flowers”-written in honor of the annual exchange of gifts between Mizell and his wife-is a merger of the album’s collective influences: It’s got a touch of soft-edged rock, a splash of balmy calypso and a healthy dose of Frisell-esque folk. The latter carries a sense of solitude and reflection, the way a lonesome traveler carries a picture of home. The former is grand and anthemic, a fireworks display accented by powerful cymbal splashes from Salters. The album’s two arbor-themed compositions-“Big Trees” and “A Song About A Tree”-make another case for Mizell’s stylistic versatility. But interspersed throughout these tunes are “Clearing Skies,” with its beseeching keyboard ostinato, and the two-part title track, a slowly blossoming statement of grace and splendor. There’s edge and attitude to tracks like “Get It While You Can,” a slice of organ-heavy funk, and “Yesterday’s Trouble,” a gravelly country thumper. Rooted in an aesthetic of twangy Americana lines, swirling contemporary keyboards and blustery hard-bop grooves, the guitarist and his colleagues slide gracefully between emotional extremes. Together these musicians concoct a sturdy soundscape out of disparate styles. Digging in beside Mizell for this effort are drummer Kenneth Salters and keyboardist Brad Whiteley, with whom the guitarist recorded 2010’s Tributary. With Negative Spaces, his fifth album as a leader, Mizell assumes the role of the altruistic collaborator, rejoining his working trio for a program of painterly originals that uses sparseness and absence in artful, melodic ways. That album-recorded on Destiny Records, the label he manages-worked well to cut a striking figure for Mizell, effectively separating the guitarist from the pack. He made his recording debut in 2004 as the captain of an eight-piece ensemble, and in 2015 he released his first solo album, a splendid collection of originals titled The Edge Of Visibility. Cameron Mizell is a New York guitarist who has worn many hats in the jazz industry-as a recording artist, as a label insider for Verve Records, as a pit guitarist for Broadway musicals and as an accompanist for various Latin ensembles around the city.
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