Spaceways Inc. has thrown a sexy curveball at those who deemed the band a sideways project for saxophonist Ken Vandermark, drummer Hamid Drake, and bassist Nate McBride. Certainly the band’s debut, Thirteen Cosmic Standards by Sun Ra & Funkadelic (also on Atavistic), offered this impression, though in all fairness it was a studio reflection of the band’s first gigs. Version Soul is perhaps the first true example of Spaceways Inc. as a collective whose love for popular music from the past and present is the basis of an exploration into nuances heretofore unheard. All nine tunes were written either by Vandermark or McBride. Many of them are dedicated to other musicians, such as “Back of a Cab” (Jackie Mittoo), “Reasonable Hour” (Serge Chaloff), “Size Large” (Larry Graham), “Clocked” (Joseph “Zigaboo” Modeliste), and a few others for figures from other expressive worlds such as “Rothko Sideways” (Mark Rothko). What they have in common is the notion of how rhythm and nuance can be transcendent and bring disparate musical elements together. In “Back of a Cab,” a series of one-drop reggae rhythms play out against a shimmering, minimal melodic line paced micronomically by McBride’s bassline equating the two — it’s reggae meets noir jazz meets the blues. On “Size Large,” dedicated to Graham Central Station founder Larry Graham, the push and pull of funk, go-go, and New Orleans second line come bubbling up under a slinky, kinky bassline as Vandermark walks the bar between syncopated street funk and deep jazz blowing. On McBride’s “Journeyman,” a nearly three-minute bass solo slithers around a lithe harmonic figure before inviting the post-bopping blues of Vandermark and Drake into the mix. When they flank him, rhythm becomes the voice of harmony and carries the swinging blues methodology into juju rhythms and back to cut time before pealing off into improvisation. The entire recording is summed up on “Clocked,” however, dedicated to the Meters’ drummer, Modeliste: the second-line funk of the mentor’s band poops and simmer along, building a quiet intensity, accented by Vandermark’s minimal melodic phrasing. Once the groove is well established, Drake begins to substitute rhythms, splitting them into fragments of time, from reggae dancehall moves to dub, plodding to Stax/Volt backbeat soul and groove and beyond. McBride creates a space for the of deep, grooving tones. His lines weave the varying tensions while offering Drake a killer series of deepening grooves to jump from. It’s startling in its in-the-pocket, slippery shimmy. Version Soul offers modern jazz a new way to go, a new dimension for grooved movement without merely quoting the glories of the past. Awesome. – Thom Jurek