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| Neil Cowley Trio – Radio Silence *** |
| Monday, 31 May 2010 10:11 | |||||||
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Naim Jazz 147 – Neil Cowley (p), Richard Sadler (b) and Evan Jenkins (d). Rec. August/September 2009 Ever since 37-year-old pianist Neil Cowley came to the ‘real thing’ via the acid jazz and chill-out scenes, he’s been rubbing the more conservative elements up the wrong way. At the same time though, his power trio has been winning over a lot more people who weren’t wasting too much energy making pointless comparisons to the jazz piano trio tradition. The third CD Radio Silence continues with the high drama and wired dance music and rock-like energy of its predecessors, the BBC Jazz Award-winning debut Displaced and Mojo magazine favourite Loud, Louder... Stop. But this time Cowley’s ‘romantic’ classical side (he was a concert hall child prodigy) takes centre stage. On a very well-recorded set of originals, tracks such as the beautiful motivic title track and ‘Desert to Rabat’ sees Cowley at his most elegiac, meditative even, investigating more abstract textures with his rhythm section than previously. But Cowley always tempers any seriousness with a natural frivolity; the tantalising, ‘A French Lesson’ sounds like it’s soundtracking the twists and turns of a Buster Keaton silent movie, while the CD’s never short of Cowley’s penchant for playful melodies as highlighted by the jittery alt rock-meets-ragtime knees-up of ‘Gerald’ and the boogiewoogie-ish ‘Hug The Greyhound’. But all this diversity doesn’t get in the way of a band that seems to have found its voice: ‘Monoface’ could be an unplugged piano trio version of a Nirvana song but its typically Cowley-like pounding chords climax sits comfortably next to the cool bluesy charm of ‘Stereoface’. This is the sound of a band maturing fast, and in the process taking more chances. It might make Radio Silence less immediate than its predecessors but this is still Cowley’s best yet. Selwyn Harris
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