Europe Jazz Media Chart - January 2021

Elegantly, Tjernberg and the band guide the listeners on a multifaceted, kaleidoscopic musical journey, where several of the songs go into each other and are presented in a longer or shorter suite form. Much of Archimedes Badkar's significant global sound and cross-border mix of music is recreated at Perfect Time. With this new edition of the group, psychedelia, blues, americana, santeria and mardi grass rhythms have also been added to the well-sounding brew. Works by Don Cherry, Duke Ellington, Bob Dylan, Son House, Dr John, Joni Mitchell, Harpo Marx and Grateful Dead that are reworked beyond recognition are combined with originals that the bandleader has largely  written on his own. During the more than 100-minute musical odyssey, the rhythm and improvisations are constantly in forward motion, regardless of the tempo at which the music is performed.

We're talking 1965. Trumpeter Don Cherry is on one of his visits to Copenhagen, to make a radio recordings with the danish musicians Mogens Bollerup (ts), Atli Bjørn (p), Benny Nielsen (b), Simon Koppel (dr). This is the same year he made "Complete Communion", one of his most exciting recordings. "Cherry Jam" has become a brilliant record with only four compositions, mostly within the hard-bop landscape, from one of our favorites on trumpet, and I think it is a surprise that the four danes are playing so well and follows Cherrys ideas so well all the way through the four tracks. Nice ensemble playing, beautiful and creative solos, and a record that all Cherry fans should have, and play often! A Cherry a day, keeps the doctor away!

Sonny Rollins had been a jazz great from his Day 1. He preceded Coltrane in jazz scene and is still active. So, it really doesn't matter what, when, where and/or with whom he played. His music is the same, his repertoire is the same (he plays standards and original compositions which eventually have become standards). He never had an established band, he performs with everyone and the outcome is almost always Rollinsesque. Thus, this album from 1967 presents us this unaltered formula with 2 Dutch virtuosi, Han Bennink on drums and Ruud Jacobs on bass. And, who could ask for anything more to end (or get rid of) a year like 2020 with such a gem of artistry?

The music of James Allsopp's Golden Age of Steam has been described as 'abstract electronica meets radical jazz'.  In this album, the group's first since 2012, the music has indeed become more electronic, and also more radical. The group has also increased in size: Alex Bonney on electronics and Ruth Goller on electric bass have joined the original trio of James Allsopp on saxophone, Kit Downes on Hammond Organ and Tim Giles on drums. There are just two tracks: Loftopus lasts for 30 minutes; the shorter track  is based on Ivor Cutler's whimsical poem about a man eating a cheese and tomato sandwich.  The music stretches the boundaries of jazz, and is always full of spontaneity and surprises.