Accelerando cover

Accelerando

Released

This is recorded and played and mixed so that you hear  bassist Stphan Crump, drummer Marcus GIlmore, and pianist Vijay Iyer equally, all of them at the front of the mix. That means that the bass and drums are much louder than you get on a jazz piano trio album, and the lower frequencies are thick. Everything is also alive and sparkly without being chaotic or shouty—this isn’t exactly dinner music, though it is very friendly. The take on the Michael Jackson classic, “Human Nature,” is good enough to justify the whole expedition, which blends Ellington and Flying Lotus tunes into a stack of Iyer compositions. Long and meaty and great.

Sasha Frere-Jones

Recommended by

Suggestions
Verisimilitude cover

Verisimilitude

Tyshawn Sorey
American Tunes cover

American Tunes

Allen Toussaint
Momenta cover

Momenta

Frankfurt Radio Bigband, Gwilym Simcock, Julian Argüelles
Montréal Diary /B (Live) cover

Montréal Diary /B (Live)

Stefano Bollani, Enrico Rava
Certain Blacks cover

Certain Blacks

Art Ensemble of Chicago
Les Stances à Sophie cover

Les Stances à Sophie

Art Ensemble of Chicago
Taking Turns cover

Taking Turns

Andrew Cyrille, Bill Frisell, Jakob Bro, Jason Moran, Lee Konitz, Thomas Morgan
Shape Memory cover

Shape Memory

Marcus Fischer, Simon Scott
Alive cover

Alive

Phronesis
Three Times Three cover

Three Times Three

Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride, John Scofield, John Patitucci, Antonio Sánchez