Michael Blake — In the Grand Scheme of Things
One of the most ambitious albums I have ever listened to bar none, Blake tackles radically different styles in effortlessly virtuosic fashion with each track, and at over 70 minutes, the CD is jam packed with music as possible. One hears the entire history of jazz in his sounds.
The opens with the odd metered drone of "Road to Lusaka", a track centered around a sailing, descending melody repeating atop a single chord, played in unison by bass and Blake's sax. The song expands into sunlit beauty as all the players lightly solo around the rhythm in a reverberant soundspace, and gradually drifts into the distance. The way they jam out over a consistent beat is similar to Fela Kuti's afrobeat.
"The Variety Hour" is a lengthy piece with a number of different sections, but each is individually quite quiet and sparse. The fragmented yet always melodic nature of the music is akin to Aaron Copland, and indeed, this album is at a classical level of compositional detail, and perfection of orchestration. The vibrant, perfectly balanced melodic counterpoints found in this track cannot be summed up in words; suffice to say, Blake must have studied his theory intensely, and practiced his tone for a lifetime. Some of the watery synth tones at the end of the track could appear on a release from the 12k label - and if you ask me it was only a matter of time before this sound intergrated fully with jazz.
"Cybermonk" is the best example of off kilter hard bop to be found on the album, with a dodgy Thelonious-esque head melody that weaves to and fro and induces head-nodding motion. After this, we get a beautiful extended solo from Blake, spiralling in and out of dissonance and tonality, to strained bleating, and back again.
Blake's heart ultimately dwells with the slower numbers, and compositions with plenty of space. Pieces like "Willie (The Lonely Cowboy)" - a wild west soliloquy, 11 minutes on its own - take up the bulk of the album. This song has the relaxed, almost bored pace of a solitary stroll down a long road, and perfectly mimics the way such a casual trip can turn into a crushing spiritual epiphany when one absent mindedly stares at the sky for too long. The ending has reduced me to tears before, a hymn for the ongoing persistence of the unappreciated, and the question of whether the loneliness will ever end.
"The Searchers" has a head melody as well, sounding a bit like one of the hazy potent Coltrane ballads, such as "Naima". Unlike "Cybermonk", though, this track quickly dissipates into an intuitive landscape of chaotic improvised sound, and the listener's rhythmic footing is totally lost. In the scheme of the album as a whole, this seems the perfectly place to drift completely into abstract realms, after the direct beauty and emotionality of "Willie".
While he toys on occasion with alien or strange moods, Blake's music is ultimately deeply soulful, warm and comforting, a spiritual labor of love. It couldn't be further from the feeling of 'process music' or technical exercise, despite the music's complexity. The album has an incredible narrative, storylike feeling, an entire world of emotions contained in the interrelationships between the songs.
Worthy of mention is the revolutionary use of Moog synthesizer in place of string bass to play walking basslines where needed, etc. I pointed this out to friends, some of which were at first unable to believe the sound was not coming from an authentic string bass (until later in the album when the synth moves into higher registers, and reveals its distinctly electronic tone). This allow's Blake's band the unique ability to mimic the sound and feel of classic jazz at one moment, and yet to journey farther into space age textural realms than any traditional ensemble ever could in the next.
This is one of the best albums I have ever heard in my life, and should equally dazzle listeners of experimental and tonal jazz, and I would hope anyone else who can recognize vision and soul in music. Michael Blake and his band have accomplished something beyond most people's ability to even imagine.