Drummer Dana Fitzsimons has joined with pianist Bill Graham and bassist Brandon Boone to embark on a magnificent project of Jazz improvisations on the album Fault Lines. It is the next evolutionary step from Fitzsimons’ 2017 debut release, with a different trio, The Cheap Ensemble. This is the stuff I love.
It is Fitzsimons’ rhythms and drive that are the propulsion of this album but Graham and Boone are more-than-willing accomplices in this splendidly emotional hijacking. Make no mistake, this is a grand collaboration. Fault Lines is hopeful and powerful, sometimes wistful, but always pulling at the depths of one’s being. It is expansive and explorative and you are more than happy to follow the quest.
After the isolation of the COVID period, the trio had the urge to return to performing together. “When we finally got together to play again, there was a lot of pent-up energy between us. We were all on the same page musically,” says Fitzsimons. “The music we wanted to make requires a lot of close listening and allowing the music to take you wherever it wants to go, untethered from strict ideas about time, form, and harmony. With all this freedom, it was important to me that the music still be rhythmic and lyrical so that the music invites the listener in, even for people who are not accustomed to free jazz.”
Let me clear, I can’t get enough of this album. If I sound like a gushing fan, it’s because I am.
They start off with Slant Anagrams by Graham. It is probably the most straight-ahead Jazz tune and bears the indelible marks of Chick Corea and Paul Motian (two other artists I admire). The precision of the trio reflects the afore-mentioned artists brilliantly.
Speaking of Motian, his It Should Have Happened a Long Time Ago is covered wonderfully. Graham’s piano is so subtly accompanied by Fitzsimons’ drums and the cool, cool bass of Boone.
Rodgers and Hart’s Where or When is the only Jazz standard on the album and it retains the gentle melancholy of the original with the depth of emotion that this trio can bring to bear. It is one of the most moving tunes on the album. Couple that with Agitation Lullaby and you’ve got music that touches your past, present, and future. Co-written by Fitzsimons and Chris Otts, it reflects Fitzsimons listening to his wife sing his children to sleep. A lovely and haunting piece. This may be my favorite piece on the album.
Crystals is a free improvisation with Fitzsimons giving no direction, only imagery. The results are each member’s interpretation of those images. Amelia by Joni Mitchell reveals the influence of Keith Jarrett’s trio with the result of sounding better than Mitchell ever did.
The rest of the tracks were all composed by pianist Bill Graham. From the ballad Ice Bridges Before Road to the anthemic Borders, the writing and the performing is extraordinary. Weeble Wobbles is wistfully innocent and reminds of the children’s toy commercial, “Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down.” The fluidic time signatures give the wobbly sensation. Fun and fascinating.
Number Six is a very fresh take on the Graham tune that Fitzsimons and Boone has heard only moments before recording the track. This is the vibrant and improvisational approach that makes this trio so hot and so satisfying. If you need more evidence of that, Intersections begins and ends with fully scribed passages but is shot in the middle with marvelous free improvisations.
Dana Fitzsimons’ Fault Lines has got everything we like in a Jazz recording: stellar musicianship, wonderful compositions, and staggeringly good improvisation from artists who know how to do all three. The rhythmic considerations offered by each member of the trio make Fault Lines more than just a drummer’s approach. It is all rhythm, all the time, and is not just rhythm in service to the melody or vice-versa, it is both in service to the musical vision.
This just may be my album of the year.
~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl
It is Fitzsimons’ rhythms and drive that are the propulsion of this album but Graham and Boone are more-than-willing accomplices in this splendidly emotional hijacking. Make no mistake, this is a grand collaboration. Fault Lines is hopeful and powerful, sometimes wistful, but always pulling at the depths of one’s being. It is expansive and explorative and you are more than happy to follow the quest.
After the isolation of the COVID period, the trio had the urge to return to performing together. “When we finally got together to play again, there was a lot of pent-up energy between us. We were all on the same page musically,” says Fitzsimons. “The music we wanted to make requires a lot of close listening and allowing the music to take you wherever it wants to go, untethered from strict ideas about time, form, and harmony. With all this freedom, it was important to me that the music still be rhythmic and lyrical so that the music invites the listener in, even for people who are not accustomed to free jazz.”
Let me clear, I can’t get enough of this album. If I sound like a gushing fan, it’s because I am.
They start off with Slant Anagrams by Graham. It is probably the most straight-ahead Jazz tune and bears the indelible marks of Chick Corea and Paul Motian (two other artists I admire). The precision of the trio reflects the afore-mentioned artists brilliantly.
Speaking of Motian, his It Should Have Happened a Long Time Ago is covered wonderfully. Graham’s piano is so subtly accompanied by Fitzsimons’ drums and the cool, cool bass of Boone.
Rodgers and Hart’s Where or When is the only Jazz standard on the album and it retains the gentle melancholy of the original with the depth of emotion that this trio can bring to bear. It is one of the most moving tunes on the album. Couple that with Agitation Lullaby and you’ve got music that touches your past, present, and future. Co-written by Fitzsimons and Chris Otts, it reflects Fitzsimons listening to his wife sing his children to sleep. A lovely and haunting piece. This may be my favorite piece on the album.
Crystals is a free improvisation with Fitzsimons giving no direction, only imagery. The results are each member’s interpretation of those images. Amelia by Joni Mitchell reveals the influence of Keith Jarrett’s trio with the result of sounding better than Mitchell ever did.
The rest of the tracks were all composed by pianist Bill Graham. From the ballad Ice Bridges Before Road to the anthemic Borders, the writing and the performing is extraordinary. Weeble Wobbles is wistfully innocent and reminds of the children’s toy commercial, “Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down.” The fluidic time signatures give the wobbly sensation. Fun and fascinating.
Number Six is a very fresh take on the Graham tune that Fitzsimons and Boone has heard only moments before recording the track. This is the vibrant and improvisational approach that makes this trio so hot and so satisfying. If you need more evidence of that, Intersections begins and ends with fully scribed passages but is shot in the middle with marvelous free improvisations.
Dana Fitzsimons’ Fault Lines has got everything we like in a Jazz recording: stellar musicianship, wonderful compositions, and staggeringly good improvisation from artists who know how to do all three. The rhythmic considerations offered by each member of the trio make Fault Lines more than just a drummer’s approach. It is all rhythm, all the time, and is not just rhythm in service to the melody or vice-versa, it is both in service to the musical vision.
This just may be my album of the year.
~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl
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