Miss the sounds of vintage hard bop that used to come from labels like Blue Note and Prestige? Here’s a trumpeter, Paul Ayick, that’s got the tone and swagger of Lee Morgan and he leads a classic quintet with Shay Eishen/dr, Leon Apostolo/b, Phil Romanov/ts-ss and Keys Henry/p that hearkens to vintage Jazz Messengers, but sounds as fresh as the morning dew. You’ve got some wonderfully hard hitters like “War Dance” and “Indecisions” that have a punch like Joe Frazier, while a hip limbo on “Little Latin Thing” has Romanov’s soprano and Ayick’s horn frothing like a wave between Henry’s marvelous piano work. On tenor, Romanov delivers a sound that could fill a stadium, and he bears down like a jack hammer on “What Band?” and gets delicate along with Ayick on the title track. These guys make good music sound so easy, but if it were, there would be more releases like this, and since there ain’t you better get this one.
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