Squawk from the Free Jazz Frontline
Many solid sides of squawk from the free jazz frontline. The scene is healthy, but you wouldn't always know it, judging by the window-display jazz being put on in most recital halls before regional academics and a few stray, mostly young, onlookers. At a recent swankfest I spied quite a few of the Jason generation, and I was actually encouraged that such young 'uns were listening to jazz at all. I was even more encouraged when I talked to some of them in the parking lot after the show, kids with names like "Regan" and "Severin," and they agreed with me that the bloat-bag we just witnessed didn't live up to the hype (mostly perpetrated by Ken Burns types anyway). Point being, there is an organic jazz scene, and once in a while they have to take a ride on the moneybags' mule-train, if only to secure the rent on their rehearsal halls. But then it's back in the doghouse for most of the authentic purveyors, while other less wise cats reap the glory. It's a simple fact of life: the shit rises to the top.
When I see these slick cats it's as if they're play-acting, trying to imitate the great ones, to pay tribute to something that once existed. Where a William Parker or a David S. Ware is simply extending the voyage, taking the eternal essence of this form of expression and bringing it to its next spiritual stopping-off point. Just as the English language must grow, the language of music must do the same. New words are added to the dictionary, new dimensions in sound are added to the spectrum of jazz.
Or that's the way it should be anyway. What these two CDs prove is, organic music thrives even in these increasingly perpendicular times. Or maybe the mask of conformity is an illusion?look at the Internet, look at indie flicks like the recent Good Grief, and look at those disillusioned Jason figures, kids for whom Columbine was their Vietnam. The more the cookie-cutter of conformity slices away, the more it impales the chaff. All is not well, and there are bound to be a lot more violent reactions to the current state of affairs than the 1 percent of cultural debris that's made readily visible would have you believe. So don't let anyone tell you there's no free jazz scene or that the current boho poetry-slam set or stapled-together butt-rag scene is shit. This is our culture and it's important.
These albums are a perfect example of this kind of linear resistance to the mundane rapture of uniformity so prevalent in our society. In bassist William Parker we behold the terminal workhorse of the scene. Whether it's leading his own Little Huey Creative Music Orchestra or joining forces with such inspired collaborators as trumpeter Roy Campbell or saxophonist David Ware, Parker is ever-present. O'Neal's Porch, his latest waxing as leader, is further proof of his peerless, godlike stature within the current milieu. Parker is so prolific it's hard to keep track of his many musings. This is a quartet date, but just last year he put out a trio record. While the drummer from that trio, Hamid Drake, is present here, the alto (and tenor) sax player on that date, Daniel Carter, has been replaced by Rob Brown. The additional member is trumpeter Lewis Barnes, who's also in the Little Huey Orchestra.
Together these four men blow a firestorm of burning intensity for more than an hour, and it's a rare and powerful thing to behold. From Drake's primal spirit-conjuring hoodoo to the careening interplay of the horns to Parker's own tire-flattening majesty, this album is easily on a par with anything by John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Charles Mingus, Eric Dolphy and other names Parker should already have joined by now in the all-time bandleader pantheon.
Parker's new duo record with drummer Hamid Drake is equally beautiful in its own way. Listening to these two ace rhythm men beat, bend and generally molest their instruments in not gentle but still nurturing ways is one of the incandescent pleasures of this strange season. Parker can make his bass sound like almost any other instrument, but if that wasn't enough he also toys around with such less conventional implements as the bombard and dumbek?pardon my ignorance for not knowing what sounds these instruments make, but I can assure you, the range is extreme, like on "Nur al Anwar," where lono-sounding Arabic blasts mix with textural percussives. Together these two mojo men lay down some damn fine late-night summoning suitable for conjuring a few primal spirits of its own.