The Air Is Different
| The Air Is Different | ||||
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| Studio album by Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up | ||||
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Publication |
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| Label (s) | 482 Music | |||
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Format (s) |
CD |
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Title (number) |
6th |
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running time |
44:09 |
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| occupation |
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Michael Lintner, Tomas Fujiwara |
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Studio (s) |
Systems Two, Brooklyn |
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The Air Is Different is a jazz album by Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up . The recordings, made in 2011 in the Systems Two Studio in Brooklyn, were released on 482 Music in 2012 .
background
The Air is Different is dedicated to Fujiwara's grandparents and is partly inspired by family memories. It is the second recording by Tomas Fujiwara with The Hook Up after Actionspeak (482 Music), her debut 2010. The drummer's ensemble has hardly changed in the line-up since it was founded in 2008; the bassist Trevor Dunn now occupied the position of Danton Boller . Trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson and tenor saxophonist Brian Settles continue to form the front line with guitarist Mary Halvorson , whose own quintet at the time had identical instrumentation.
Track list
- Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air Is Different (482 Music 482-1079)
- Lineage 7:47
- Double Lake, Defined 3:30
- For Ours 5:09
- Cosmopolitan (Rediscovery) 6:07
- Smoke-Breathing Lights 10:52
- Postcards 11:44
- All compositions are by Tomas Fujiwara.
reception
Mike Shanley wrote in JazzTimes that what makes the second release of Hook Up really exciting has to do with the way Fujiwara abruptly ends his melodies, precisely when the band sounds like they are slowly settling into something. He makes the listener pause to think about what just happened and how strong it sounded.
According to Troy Collins, who reviewed the album in All About Jazz and awarded it 4½ stars, Fujiwara combines everything from impressionistic accents to driving polyrhythms and underpins the process with a spacious, orchestral sensitivity. He prepares the stage for a series of exploratory excursions in which strict framework conditions are carefully balanced with unrestricted improvisations. Even during turbulent passages, the recording exudes a touch of meditative calm; the omnipresent mood is due to the influence of Fujiwara's late grandfather, a Zen Buddhist priest, as recorded in the liner notes . The same text illuminates Fujiwara's diverse interests and cites the overtones of a Buddhist bell bowl as inspiration for the opening of the majestic "Lineage", the freestyle verses by rapper Talib Kweli , as the basis for the angular miniature "Double Lake, Defined" and the work of Björk and Henry Threadgill as the source for the chameleon-like swinger "For Ours". The piece, dedicated to Fujiwara's mother, consists of three separate movements, ranging from a strict introduction and a lush, harmonious middle section to a soul-stirring finale. The Air is Different is another strong performance by Fujiwara, summarizes Collins, "whose presence as the rising leader of the scene is growing in importance with each release."
Also in All About Jazz , Robert Bush wrote that Fujiwara is an excellent drummer with an ultra-layered approach to advancing the cymbal dynamics, but that it is his compositions above all that are at the center of this recording. The Air Is Different since "full of haunting melodies, quirky rhythms and varied solos." The album is wildly creative music that never lapses into inaccessibility. If one was wondering where jazz could lead in the new millennium, this is a good start.
Nate Chinen wrote in The New York Times that Fujiwara gives Hook Up , his version of a postbop quintet, an empathetic and agile intensity. The Air is Different reflects his drive as a composer. The flexibility that is in Fujiwara's compositions is a blessing for his bandmates; her work on a piece called “Smoke-Breathing Lights” brings the productive tension of free improvisation against a stable framework.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Troy Collins: Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air is Different. All About Jazz, May 15, 2012, accessed June 7, 2020 .
- ↑ Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air Is Different at Discogs
- ↑ Mike Shanley: Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air is Different. JazzTimes, July 1, 2012, accessed June 7, 2020 .
- ↑ Robert Bush: Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air is Different. All About Jazz, May 16, 2012, accessed May 7, 2020 .
- ↑ Nate Chinen: Record Store Day Specials and Some Asian Vibes: Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up: The Air is Different. The New YorkTi, es, April 29, 2012, accessed May 7, 2020 .