eMusic Review 0
Perhaps knowing how tough it would be to top last year's In Pursuit, McCaslin instead changes the focus slightly to a piano-less trio, delivering another ferocious blowout that burnishes his luster among hardcore jazz heads. The exalted history of tenor sax backed by just bass and drums is topped by Rollins at the Village Vanguard and Coltrane on Lush Life, and Recommended Tools displays some of the sharp angles and breakneck bounce of those talismanic trio records.
The torrential flow of ideas and lower-register dips McCaslin executes during his unaccompanied, four-and-a-half minute solo on “The Champion” (dedicated to Brazilian composer-musician Hermeto Pascoal) is reminiscent of vintage Rollins (no mean feat), and his quicksilver yet rarely garrulous phrasing throughout harkens not only to Coltrane, but outside-inside altoists like Marty Ehrlich and Anthony Braxton. Even songs that begin as ballads or airy mid-tempo tunes, such as Strayhorn's “Isfahan” or McCaslin's own “Margins of Solitude,” inevitably turn up the intensity, abetted by the churning rhythm section of bassist Hans Glawischnig and drummer Jonathan Blake.
Recommended Tools is not as immediately accessible as In Pursuit, but neither is it technically daunting or laden with shrieks and whirlpooled cul-de-sacs. “Excursion” has… read more »
