MUSIC

Bebop Club, Bristol (Fri 25 Nov)

These days there’s so much going on in the name of jazz that it’s hard to get a handle on sometimes, but apart from the original New Orleans ‘Dixie’ sounds, it’s probably the 50s and 60s ‘hard bop’ music that most people still consider properly ‘jazzy’. Drummer Art Blakey’s ongoing Messengers band was the stable that honed much of hard bop’s talent, and Bristol drummer John Blakeley’s latest project celebrates the wealth of material composed by Messenger graduates, as well as the snappy fulsomeness of the band’s sound. It’s a good call and he’s recruited well so this well-attended gig gets straight to work (smokelessness notwithstanding) to recreate the smooth seediness of a downtown 60s jazz club. Frontline players Nick Malcolm (trumpet), Jake McMurchie (tenor) and Kevin Figes (alto) provide both tightly harmonised unity and superbly measured solos while in the rhythm section Dan Moore’s keyboards snatch and grab the chords from Greg Cordez’s rolling basslines. Blakely, behind the kit, is licensed to (over)kill but the acoustic context holds him back somewhat and it’s really only on a couple of solos that he grandstands in the appropriately Artful way. Highlights are definitely the ultra-hep reading of Nat Adderley’s ‘One For Daddy-O’ and an impassioned blast through Wayne Shorter’s ‘Lester Left Town’, both featuring blistering flights from Malcolm’s trumpet and the two sax players. Given that he’s depping, Cordez’s bass is impressively assertive and well matched with Moore’s nimble piano, which at times references Bobby Timmons and Horace Silver (both sometime Messengers’ pianists). Blakeley’s solid groove is very much to the point, with hints of great flair, and it feels as though it would be great to hear him in a big room where the drums could really let rip. Whatever – this is the kind of comforting jazz, full of life and humour, that makes an evening slip by in sheer hep-cat bliss. (Tony Benjamin)

Copyright Tony Benjamin 2011