Four and Five [Import]

Four and Five [Import]

Track Listings

1. Jump

2. Four and Five

3. Zilch, Zero, Zed

4. Blues For

5. Method

6. Xis

7. Take the Coltrane

Editorial Reviews
From Jazziz
John Lloyd plays alto sax with a clear, somewhat thin tone. Cello (Stan Adler), bass (Marcio Mattos), and drums (Paul Clarvis) supply a cool, open bustle that splits the difference between free improvisation and jazz. Lloyd pecks away at fragments of melody. Bowed high, the cello sounds brassy, almost like another horn; plucked, it adds another layer of rhythm, like a guitar. Moorish and Indian flavors appear, but never with much attention to specificities of rhythm. Hat Art's annotator, Brian Marley, does Lloyd a disservice by comparing him to labelmates Anthony Braxton and Steve Lacy. Lloyd neither composes nor blows anything on that scale. On Duke Ellington's "Take the Coltrane," the improv angle seems to be an excuse to play a tune without much care where the notes go. Free improvisation is predicated on vicious rhythmic alertness. Pass on that, and you have jazz as an empty shell, dry and juiceless. Suddenly Lloyd's music feels calculated, aimed at an audience who thinks abstraction is a sign of sophistication. In a brief statement of intent, Lloyd claims he "subverts" the blues genre "by removing the underlying groove." But the doctrine he supports, that a groove must hamper invention, is an academic fantasy. Great blues players - from Johnny "Guitar" Watson to Gene "Mighty Flea" Connors, even Freddie Hubbard on a funky day - play right across whatever rhythm is happening. the idea of Lloyd's limp neoclassicism subverting anyone or anything is simply ridiculous.

Four and Five,Jon Lloyd,hatHUT,Avant-Garde Jazz,Free Jazz,Jazz,Post-Bop

Jazz Music: Four and Five [Import]

Jazz Music: