Avishai Cohen's Big Rain

Avishai Cohen's "After the Big Rain," which prominently featured keyboardist Jason Lindner and guitarist Lionel Loueke, was one of the best albums of 2007; the only problem brought up by the glossies, if it could be called a problem, was that the album sounded more like a Lionel Loueke record than an Avishai Cohen record. Cohen, who has probably had to spend his entire life contending with people asking "Avishai Cohen, you mean like the bass player," was probably miffed at these reviews. "Flood," the second part in his "Big Rain" trilogy, proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the vision behind these albums is his and his alone.

Lindner and Loueke are both gone, and while their playing was part of what made "After the Big Rain" such a rich album they are not missed here. Cohen opted for a bass-less trio, and the only hold-over from "After the Big Rain" is drummer Daniel Freedman (the other member of the trio is pianist Yonatan Avishai, who together with Freedman and Cohen make up 3/4s of Third World Love). There are obvious differences between the two albums: "After the Big Rain" featured cutting edge electronics while "Flood" is all acoustic; "After the Big Rain" featured vocals on many tracks courtesy of Loueke. The differences are all surface though- Cohen's vision for the two albums is in many ways identical. Motifs from "Big Rain" resurface on "Flood," and his playing on the new album is related if not identical to his playing on "After the Big Rain."

Musically, "Flood" is exactly like it's title. The sounds- initial drips of Avishai's piano which lead to waves of Freedman's percussion and finally violent cascades of Cohen's trumpet- evoke quite literally the sounds of a flood. In a sense, "Flood" is a more unified album musically than "After the Big Rain," as the band has a tendency to act more like a single musician than on the previous album; on "Big Rain" there was usually a clear soloist, and while the band was interactive, it was easy to tell whose turn it was. On "Flood," however, the players weave in and out organically, for the service of the music and the concept. Highly recommended.

I'm curious to hear Cohen's next record, which according to his website will be the first part of this trilogy ("Before the Flood?" "Before the Big Rain?" "Clouds?"), and will be a big band date. After "After the Big Rain," an odd instrumentation combo record, and "Flood," a bass-less trio record, it will be interesting to hear how Cohen's concept fits into a large ensemble.

Leftovers: Contemporary Reissue Edition

When I say "contemporary," I'm neither talking about the jazz record label, Contemporary, nor making a sarcastic reference to the fact that nothing truly contemporary could be reissued; both of the reissues that I'm going to review hear were initially released in roughly the last ten years, so they can tell us a lot about the contemporary jazz scene. Avishai Cohen, the bass player, is sort of like the John the Baptist to Anat Cohen's (no relation) Christ figure in the Israeli jazz scene. After playing with Chick Corea for a while, Avishai Cohen struck out on his own with a record, "Adama," that lightly fused middle-eastern musical ideas with jazz. Granted, it was nothing nearly as bombastic as what John Zorn had been doing with Masada for years already, but the fact that it was a real, live Israeli who had played with Chick Corea who was doing it meant something. The other reissue, Mark Feldman's "Music For Violin Alone," has nothing in common with Cohen's straight-ahead Israeli music. In spite of Feldman's credentials as a founding member of John Zorn's Masada String Trio, "Music For Violin Alone" has most in common with 20th century avant garde music for violin.

"Adama," Avishai Cohen's first album and the harbinger of Israeli dominance in the jazz world in recent years, has worn extremely well. Yes, in recent years people have found newer and arguably more innovative ways of working middle eastern influence into jazz. Yes, Omer Avital is now the go-to bass player for all of the Israelis in New York. No, none of the other players on "Adama" are major players in the Israeli jazz scene in Brooklyn. Who cares? With Steve Wilson on soprano, Jeff Ballard on drums, and either Brad Mehldau or Chick Corea on piano, there is no possible way to go wrong, and everybody plays up to their talent. Cohen himself shines on the funky "Bass Suite #s 1 & 2." Sparks also fly on "Gadu," in which Mehldau and Corea are given a chance to trade off, with Corea on electric keyboards and Mehldau on piano. Recommended.

Mark Feldman's "Music For Violin Alone" is easily one of the most jarring recordings I've heard recently. Falling somewhere between Jenny Scheinman's most avant garde early work and the experimental classical music of composers like George Crumb, Feldman does his best to create music that cannot be ignored. Feldman has played on hundreds of recordings a studio musician, for artists as varied as Zorn and Johnny Cash, but this music is a far cry from virtually anything else he's done as a sideman. Front and center, Feldman's music runs a gamut from the screaming, abrasive noise of "Etude" to the angry motivic rhythms of "Jete" to the pensive, quiet, middle-eastern flavored "Calista-" and that's only over the course of three tracks. "Music For Violin Alone" manages to be all over the place musically while being unmistakable as a work by Feldman. I add this caveat to my reviews of a lot of albums, but "Music For Violin Alone" is not for everyone. It's a far cry from straight ahead jazz, and for some people parts of it could sound like a guy trying to make weird noises with his violin. But, that said, this album is recommended for those with open ears.

Next time I'll have reviews of Nicole Mitchell's latest albums, "Black Unstoppable" and "Xenogenesis Suite."

Zydeco Clowns and Israeli Ex-Patriates

John Ellis and Third World Love have virtually nothing in common in terms of music, although if you wanted to play six degrees of separation they have both played with Mike Moreno at some point in their careers (John Ellis on Moreno's most recent album; Avishai Cohen with Moreno on Yosvany Terry's "Metamorphosis"). Granted, that sort of random ephemera doesn't really help anyone, or tell anyone what either group sounds like, but it's illustrative of how small the jazz world is during the Monk generation (neither Ellis nor the members of Third World Love went to the Monk Institute, but they've both played with people who have, and Cohen was a finalist in the Monk Institute's trumpet competition in the late 90s). Either way, while the aesthetics of "New Blues" and "Dance Like There's No Tomorrow" are totally different, they're both extremely interesting and worth listening to.

One track, titled "Zydeco Clowns on the Lawn," neatly summarizes the entirety of John Ellis' "Dance Like There's No Tomorrow." After opening up with squeals and other various clown noises, the track moves into a groove partly anchored by Gary Versace's organ, but also partly anchored by what any sane person initially thinks is a bass. A few seconds later, when it becomes clear that this funky music is actually being bottomed out by Matt Perrine's sousaphone (If you only click one link, click that one, Perrine's version of "The Washington Post March" is brilliant), it comes into focus that perhaps this is not music for sane people. This is not a problem, as far as I'm concerned; a surplus of good music isn't necessarily made for (or by, for that matter) people with good heads on their shoulders, and this music is too fun to ignore just because it's a little zany. There's almost no point in going into specific tracks, because somehow Ellis manages to give them perfect descriptions in their titles (even, somehow, when a track is called "Tattooed Teen Waltzes With Grandma"). This album is well worth a listen, maybe the jazz summer-party-record of 2008.

Third World Love, Avishai Cohen's band with Israeli partners-in-crime Yonatan Avishai (piano), Omer Avital (bass), and Daniel Freedman (drums), has the most in common with John Ellis on the title track of their "New Blues;" a mixture of middle eastern flavor and contemporary jazz harmony, but with a funky New Orleans beat, as well as an infectious melody, the track soars. And everything on the record is that good. While Avishai's sister, clarinet and saxophone player Anat, has been getting the most mention in the last two years ("New Blues" was released on her record label, Anzic) because of her constant stream of new music, Avishai deserves a lot more space in the trades. Last year he released "After the Big Rain," easily one of my favorite releases of 2007, and with "New Blues" he has staked a claim for Third World Love as one of the top young bands in jazz.

I don't know what I'll have next time to be honest (I'm living moment to moment with this blog), but expect something here on Tuesday. Maybe I'll do my "Top Five Tunes of the Spring" a few days before I had initially planned if I can't find "Esperanza" anywhere.