If you’re a fan of vintage Miles Davis, which means anything from about ’58 to before he plugged in during the late 60s, trumpeter Tomasz Stanko should be the guy on your must-hear list. He’s put out a number of wonderful releases over the past decade, most of them on ECM with his long term trio. This time out, he’s cleaned out the garage and brought in a new team of David Virelles/p, Thomas Moran/b, and Gerald Cleaver/dr for this double disc release. The ten tunes are bookended by two variatiosn of the hauntingly agonizing and lovingly drawn out title tracks, and each one is like a logical progression of ESP-inspired music that mixes post bop jazz with Eastern European pathos.
Stanko’s pungent tone and phrasing is visceral and riveting on material like “Metafizyka” and flows over the restrained agitation of percussion on “Faces.” Virelles’ Lisztian piano is a dramatic counterplay to Morgan’s bass on the yearning “Mikrokosmos” while “Dernier Cri” gently shifts like sand during a gentle Saharan breeze. Stanko’s dark shadows hang over the kinetic and assertive “A Shaggy Vandal” while he floats like an orange leaf on “Song For H.” This is music that is felt all the way to your cerebellum, reminding you of things you thought were out of your psych. Fascinating sounds and emotions.
ECM Records