Magnus Broo/Adam Lane/Paal Nilssen-Love/Ken Vandermark – 4 Corners (CF 076)
This album brings us back to more familiar territory : the quartet à la Ornette Coleman with Vandermark on sax, Magnus Broo on trumpet , Adam Lane on bass and Paal Nilssen-Love on drums. All of them are fantastic musicians, yet Adam Lane is my favorite here (check out the CD’s he released in the past years). And the result of these gentlemen’s combined effort is excellent. The first piece “Alfama” immediately offers all the variation you might expect from such a band : strong pulsing rhythms with unisono sax and trumpet, coming to a sudden halt for a long unaccompanied bluesy trumpet solo, that is first supported by some subtle drums which forces the energy back into the piece, into higher and more intense spheres, picked up by a hard-bopping sax solo like runners in a 4 x 100 relay race. The second piece “Spin With the EARth” starts with an African theme and melody, reminiscent of Don Cherry, that is deconstructed into shreds of solo and it gets gradually built up again rhythmically. On “Lucia” Vandermark steals the show with his fiery bass clarinet soloing. This CD offers a lot : freejazz, hard bop, blues, afro-jazz, funk, intens harmonic interplay and shouting counterpoint.
Of all the line-ups Vandermark played in for the last years, 4 Corners is one of the best. Adam Lane brings a deep musical and bluesy feeling to the band, and Broo adds the melodic and sometimes joyous sound.
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