Jon Lundbom and Big Five Chord, Bring Their 'A' Game, The EP Series

 I happily return here to report on the second in a series of four EP disks by Jon Lundbom and Big Five Chord. This one, just out, is called Bring Their 'A' Game (Hot Cup). It continues where the first, Make the Magic Happen, leaves off. (I covered that one last month here.) Yep, they continue with another vibrant set that has compositional bite with two hefty originals and once again closing with an Ornette perennial. It also has the growl of the band in improvisational fullness. Jon plays some beautiful guitar as one expects, he IS one of a kind after all. But then you get some supercharged sax from Jon Irabagon and Balto Exclamationpoint, and beautiful rhythm section effusions from Moppa Elliott (bass) and Dan Monaghan (drums).

This is take-no-prisoners out bop and more. Make no mistake. Lundbom has the subtle leadership that gets everybody to give of things their considerable all, and Jon does the same. Can I just say "chuck everything and get it"? Well I will.

The remaining two EPs will be coming out later on in the year. You can get each one as it comes out, or pre-order now for the 4-CD box set that will come out when the fourth CD does, thereabouts.

If the other two are like the first two, there is something important going on! There is already!

Jon Lundbom & Big Five Chord, Make the Magic Happen

Critics, of which I suppose I am one, are as is the fashion out of style, if social media is any indication (and of course that is an open question!). In some views they are leeches, wanna bee's, axe-grinding subjectivists. Well bull-dingie to that. Never paid for work (I mean by publishers, of course, one does not take money for reviews from artists unless one is a sleaze), facing foreclosure and eviction, poor to the point where in winter my toes turn black from horrible frostbite because I cannot afford enough heat, facing possible homelessness, I am doing these blogs because the music is all-important to me. Otherwise, I would be plain-crazy!  Leech? What is it I get out of this? And if I make a point of covering everything Jon Lundbom & Big Five Chord comes out with, it is because the music they make is simply and OBJECTIVELY wonderful. So far. Got it? Now if I sound like as a friend of mine puts it, I am "pulling a Mingus" by being disagreeable and even angry, so be it.

Seriously though, I have been totally zoned in with Lundbom and company's excursions. Their new project this year is a series of four digital EPs by the band, the first of which is out, Make the Magic Happen (Hot Cup). It is another good one. There are three pieces going down here, Ornette Coleman's "Law Years," in honor of and remembrance of a master taken sadly from us recently. Then there is Lundbom's "Ain't Cha," based on Parker and Gillespie's intro to "All the Things You Are" as put forward on the Bird & Diz platter years ago. And then there is Lundbom's "La Bomb," which is an extension of his earlier number "New Feats of Horsemanship." And yes, there is that humor here if you look for it--subtle, less of the horse-laugh type, but what of it? If we cannot laugh a little, we are doomed to get a POTUS who makes us all cry. And there is nothing funny about that. But I digress and the net bots hate digressions and punish accordingly, so...

This is a band that has great depth in the combination of Lundbom's very original guitar work, a formidable two-horn punch with Jon Irabagon and Balto Exclamationpoint (the artist formerly known as...), Moppa Elliot on bass and Dan Monaghan on drums (with his snare sounding especially fetching), or in other words a great rhythm team.

This EP is a rousing start to things. As important as anything they've put our way and some Lundbom guitar that will get you searching your pockets for a pick to play air guitar with....In short, excellent music!

This whole EP thing is a cool idea. You can of course purchase each one as it comes out. (The next volume is due April 1st). Or you can pre-order all four in advance from Hot Cup and save 15%. Finally, you can wait until they are all out and get the four in a box set. All the proceeds go to the artists! So why worry? Just dig into this music.

Jon Lundbom and Big Five Chord, Jeremiah

Now that all the hooting and hollering about Blue is behind us, I trust we can get back to the music other than that one! MOPDTK of course is one outfit and Jon Lundbom and Big Five Chord is another. There are members that span both groups, but the two have managed to maintain separate identities. Both have a sense of humor and both do some amazing music.

The Jon Lundbom aggregation have come through with a new one, Jeremiah (Hot Cup 142), that should remind us (the Catholic "we") that these cats still kick some exceptionally large butt. Or is it that they kick butt very swiftly and in a timely manner? Never mind the turn of phrase. You I am sure get me.

This album is another scorcher. Jon Lundbom supplies most of the compositional frames and they jump out at you. But he also is an exceptional electric guitarist who needs to be listened to. He has a jagged style that is out in a linear way but rhythmically outstanding as well. I won't say that he has the rhythmic sensibility of later Zappa, but both manage to play with time and against time in their own distinctive way. So his guitar wielding is something to hear.

The band is at its iconoclastic best again on this one. They have two guests who add to the mix in good ways. They are Justin Wood on alto and flute, Sam Kulik on trombone. So you get four horns for the compositional gathering and the guests solo well too.

Otherwise it's the potent combination of Lundbom, Jon Irabagon on soprano, Bryan Murray on tenor and baltosax, Moppa Elliot on bass, and Dan Monaghan on drums (and that snare!....sorry, a little allusion to some humor expressed by band members on social media in reference to my naming their last album as a "Record of the Year" last December).

If you don't think these guys can be funny listen to Bryan Murray's solo entrance on "The Bottle." Why it is funny I cannot put into words, but some of AEC's playing in their heyday was funny in inexpressible ways like that.

But the band is also dead serious of course. This is more of the gathering's remarkable music, evolutionarily modern, a superb outcropping of where things have been going in the realm of advanced "jazz."

That's a truth I feel and I am happy to express it. If this album sells--and of course I wish it does--it is nothing to do with controversy. It is for the excellence of the music. It's here to hear, so give it your ear.

Jon Lundbom & Big Five Chord, Liverevil

There is a group of young titans out there who intermingle in their different ensembles freely and make some great jazz music in the process. There is Mostly Other People Do the Killing, Bryan and the Haggards, and today's incarnation, Jon Lundbom & Big Five Chord. The recent 2-CD live set Liverevil (Hot Cup 131) has been out for a little while and it's something.

With Jon Lundbom on electric guitar at the front, we have a potent lineup of Jon Irabagon on alto and soprano saxes, Bryan Murray on tenor and balto! saxes, Moppa Elliot on acoustic bass, Dan Monaghan on drums, and special guest Matt Kanelos on keys.

The band really benefits from the longer cuts and a sympathetic audience, it seems to me. Everybody kicks in with committment. The solos from everyone are excellent. And the tunes are extremely hip, too! There is a little bit of humor with these guys and it's more than refreshing. Yet they are serious players. Serious!!

Jon Lundbom is a guitarist who takes it out in his very own way. There is a full press of note-fullness, a way of patterning in extended chromatic territory that is quite original, and a soulful delivery. In many ways he has arrived, but then so has this band.

Two slabs of excellence, two-CDs, two for your ear-growing exercises. This is the one to get first, I think! Then get the others...

Nathaniel Smith Quartet Debuts with Jon Irabagon

Nathaniel Smith, MUSICAL drummer. That's what I know from his recent debut as a leader of a fine quartet on a CD simply titled Nathaniel Smith Quartet (Fresh Sound New Talent 371). He is also thoroughly schooled in the modern jazz drumming tradition. He swings lightly but accentually; he shows a good feel for brushwork; he gets around his set to provide a lot of good sounds. His skills as a tunesmith are also first rate. Five of the seven pieces on the album are his. They provide distinctive feels, good lines, and very conducive frameworks for the improvisations they set up.

Nathaniel also shows himself a bandleader who can handpick a few choice colleagues to develop a group chemistry that goes well beyond the considerable individual skills involved. Jostein Gulbrandsen is a fine guitarist. His subtle comping and incisive solo style gives the band a personality that it would not have without him. He also writes two numbers for the set, both of interest. Bassist Mark Anderson is another good choice. He underscores the rhythmic-harmonic structures of the pieces with good sense, fine tone and rock solid swingtime. Then there is Jon Irabagon and his tenor. He most certainly is one of the important new voices on his instrument, as a member of Mostly Other People Do the Killing and as a leader in his own right on a number of impressive albums. He can be incredibly exhuberant and boisterous, but on this quartet date he harnesses the dynamo for a group give and take. It's another side of Jon you hear on this one, just a shade cooler but quite lucid, never at a loss for ideas.

So there you have it. The sum of all these parts is a very thoughtfully swinging modern session. Gulbrandsen's guitar solos stand out as exceptionally interesting and we get to see another side of Jon Irabagon. This is serious jazz from start to finish. No frills, no bull. It's one of the best of the loosely straightforward improvisational sessions I've heard so far this year.

Congrats to Nathaniel Smith and his bandmates on this one!

Guitarist Mary Halvorson and Her New "Saturn Sings" Recording

Some artists get a certain amount of buzz out there at a certain point in their careers. Guitarist Mary Halvorson is one of them right now. She's written about, lands some prominent gigs and comes to the fore with her latest CD Saturn Sings (Firehouse 12 FH12-04-01-013).

The album pits Halvorson and her regular trio (with Ches Smith on drums and John Hebert, bass) augmented by Jonathan Finlayson on trumpet and Jon Irabagon on alto, the latter of whom has been generating some buzz himself.

It's ten Halvorson compositions with an inside-outside approach put together for the augmented band. Heads and tonality are related to contemporary jazz trends with some quirks; solos and the rhythm section bring in the free aspects of the music to a greater or lesser degree.

There are an interesting series of numbers here and Mary Halvorson shows in her solo style what all the talk is about. She is not one for 32nd-note runs. What she does do is combine note clusters-chords with loping or angular line work and somewhat restrained episodes of skronk outness. Her treatment of chording (with or without what sounds like the whammy) gives her a distinctive sound. Her tone is usually more in the straight-ahead zone than in one of a rock-inflected effects-orientation, though there are moments of shred-tone cranked in for short intervals here and there. To hear her comp is to hear something singular.

Finlayson and Irabagon make for sympathetic and simpatico fellow front liners. They have things to say and they say them.

What you end up with is a convincing set of modern music that should appeal to jazz fanciers and guitar students out there. It is good evidence as to why the buzz about Mary isn't just talk.