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Jazz Prospecting
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Tom Hull - on the Web, Jazz Prospecting >>
Steve Reid Ensemble: Daxaar (2007, Domino):
Album cover claims "(recorded in africa)" in small bold print against an outline of the continent. The title is evidently an archaic spelling of Dakar, the capital of Senegal, where Reid picked up trumpet (Roger Ongolo), guitar (Jimi Mbaye), bass (Dembel Diop), kora (Isa Kouyate, also spelled Koyate, while kora is also spelled korah), and percussion (Khadim Badji), studio pros with Youssou N'Dour and Super Diamono and others on their resumes. Kouyate also provides a vocal on the first song, called "Welcome," which is the only thing here that is unmistakably Senegalese. The rest are seductive little groove pieces. While the Africans go with the flow and flesh them out admirably, the real interest is in the keyboards (Boris Netsvetaev) and electronics (Kieran Hebden, who also does business as Four Tet), light and fleeting details in a thick jungle tableau. Reid's a drummer with a Zelig-like list of credits -- Martha Reeves' "Dancing in the Streets," John Coltrane, James Brown, Ornette Coleman, Fela Kuti, Sun Ra, Miles Davis -- despite spending most of his life in obscurity as an exile, now snug in Switzerland. He got some notice in 2006 for The Exchange Session, two volumes of laptop-drums improvs with Hebden, and that paid for his ticket to Africa. Not the first time he's been back, but this time he brought something extra to the party. A-
--Tom Hull 02/11/08 >> go there
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