Get hold of this one if you can–this is a pretty primal sax workout record on a par with such other recent but fairly unheralded ventures as Odean Pope’s Ebioto and Papo Vazquez’s At the Point Volume One (both from ’99). Sylvester, who’s fooled around with big band stuff in the past, has finally found his groove with his new Afro-Caribbean Trio. While the percolating rhythms–courtesy of Donald Nicks on bass and the renowned Bobby Sanabria–have a Latin flavor, the music is pure jazz (whatever that means in the post-Ken Burns era). Most free-blowing sax albums like this–and by that I do not mean that this is "free jazz," because it’s actually very structured and melodic, but that Sylvester blows freely–rely heavily on their rhythm sections anyway to propel the soloist to new heights. These two cats do not let us down; although in the past Sanabria has played a host of Latino percussive devices, here he sticks to mostly kit-work, but it still comes off as Latin jazz because it’s in the man’s blood after all. But Sanabria’s musical focus is a lot wider than many of his peers who stay entrenched in the stolid world-music ghetto. I just read an interview with him where he claims that growing up his dad had a great collection of James Brown 45s and those kinds of rhythms obviously influenced him as much as, say, Tito Puente’s. In the end, the best music is always a hybrid anyway, and the best Latin music could easily work as r&b and vice versa.
Donald Nicks mostly plays electric bass, which gives this album even more of a funky quality. Once again, I think a good rhythm section is the key to a lead player really cooking and these three men seem to have a genuinely sympathetic understanding for one another as far as musical interaction goes. They don’t get in one another’s way, in other words, and the results are long and fruitful excursions like "Songoajira," where they even slip in a little "Louie Louie." It’s uncredited but it’s there. And why shouldn’t it be? It’s just little snickers like this that prove these cats aren’t academic smoothies who want to gloss over the rough spots, but whooping participants in the very party that Ken Burns and others of his ilk seemed to have missed. "Louie Louie" is a standard at this point that fits any ethnomusical idiom. Lester Bangs once drew the connection between "Louie Louie" and Ritchie Valens’ "La Bamba," which just means it evolved from Latin rhythms in the first place. Actually, when Richard Berry, a black man, wrote the original tune, he was copping Chuck Berry’s "Havana Moon," which was Berry’s attempt to play an almost Caribbean type of rhythm. Jorge’s group is called the Afro-Caribbean Experimental Trio so he no doubt gets the connection, hence the musical quote. As far as I’m concerned, they oughtta make "Louie Louie" the new national anthem. It would serve well in George Bush’s America because Bush was a fratboy and they always called "Louie Louie" "frat-rock" so everything connects once again.
As for Sylvester, he’s one the most capable soloists holding an alto today–"Por la Clave," for instance, is full of outright Ornette-ish inflections with ample support once again from the rhythm section. There are several gutbucket textures here that evoke the wailing harmonic breadth of some of jazz’s best improvisers, from Eric Dolphy to Sonny Simmons. Nicks solos on electric bass during this number, and Sanabria is all over his kit. The musicians hold back, let one another work, jump back in and never miss a beat. It’s a restrained but flawless stream of emotive improvising and it heralds one of the greater underlooked talents of the day. Jorge we never knew ye!
Joe S. Harrington
Girls
Can Tell
Spoon
(Merge)
It’s so great to see an underdog triumph. Three years ago Spoon was just a good bar band from Austin that ended up on a major label. Then they became a good bar band from Austin who got dumped by their major label within mere months, and subsequently released a vicious double A-sided single directed at their former A&R rep, a guy named Ron Laffitte; the songs were "The Agony of Laffitte" and "Laffitte Don’t Fail Me Now," and the lyrics included the line, "Are you ever honest with anyone?" The stunt was too good. It got picked up by every reviewer under the sun, and it threatened to overshadow the band’s music and the considerable talents of its leader, Britt Daniel.
Girls Can Tell is the reason they’ll be remembered for more than the mistakes of Elektra’s A&R. It’s perfect neo-new-wave chamber pop, made with a stripped-down band and careful application of piano and organ. It’s an intimate record, like Joe Jackson’s Night and Day or Elvis Costello’s This Year’s Model, mingling joy, anguish and despair over the sounds of a steady, mumbling pulse and a few carefully chosen atmospherics. Daniel even affects a British accent in a few spots, like "The picture is coomin’ around now," on "Lines in the Suit." Usually it really bugs me when American singers use fake British accents, but here it just seems cute. It’s not mimicry, but a quick lyrical wink. It also brings to mind another fine post-partum album recorded by an underappreciated pop-rock band that had been mistreated by a major–the Figgs’ Couldn’t Get High, which was recorded with friends in New Jersey in 1997 with money from Capitol’s contract buyout. The Figgs’ previous albums on majors had been slightly unfocused, but once they were relieved of their corporate burden and sat down with only themselves to please, they made the best work of their career.
Same goes for Daniel and Girls Can Tell, which was recorded at drummer Jim Eno’s house, at the band’s expense, without a label, and shopped around afterward. Elektra passed on it. But Merge didn’t. The songs are about girls, Dad’s crisp hand-me-down shirts, girls, old AM radio, girls–the usual oblique indie rock stuff that makes you spin it again and again to figure out what the singer’s telling you. It’s not revenge–Daniel already got that. It’s just beautiful music.
Ben Sisario
