Jazz-Rock Fusion Today with Belgium's The Wrong Object

Originally posted on March 17, 2008

The world of jazz-rock has had its ups and downs in the past several decades. Once disco-funk invaded the world of fusion it seemed fashionable to turn away altogether. From around the time of the millennium, however, serious jazz-rock seemed to turn another page and the music began coming back.

One of the bands who is in the new vanguard is “The Wrong Object,” a horn and guitar oriented mid-size group that hails from Belgium. They began by playing covers of Frank Zappa’s music and broadened out with their own originals. A recent collaboration with the late Elton Dean, wind man for the Soft Machine and its modern-day offshoots, brought them to my attention (See my review in this past January’s Cadence Magazine). Moonjune Records has followed up with the band in its own full-flown glory, Stories from the Shed.

Bass and drums are in the tight yet busy and driving vein. Fred Delplanco on tenor and Jean-Paul Estievenart on trumpet and flugelhorn, respectively, form a solid ensemble and can solo with weight. Guitar and Electronics man Michel Delville plays an idiomatic axe that can groove as well as wail and writes much of the band’s material. Like the Later Soft Machine and Zappa, it is certainly the music itself that sets them apart. There is much of musical merit to digest on this disk and I recommend it highly.