Merging the organic sounds of post-bop jazz with modern electronic and progressive music requires a delicate approach. This third album in less than two years from the admired
Chicago Underground collective achieves a near perfect balance. Most interesting is the persistent influence of post-rock (members of
the Chicago Underground form the funk group
Isotope 127 with members of
Tortoise) in both the repetitive texturing ("Tunnel Chrome") and the
Marc Ribot-ish guitar tones of
Jeff Parker. Weighing in also are leader
Rob Mazurek's fascination and command of
Ornette Coleman-style free jazz ("Welcome," "Nostaslgia," "Sink, Charge, Fixture").
Mazurek was before the formation of
the Chicago Underground a world-class traditional jazz cornetist, but as a progressive, he uses it as an effective sound-sculpturing tool. On the electro-fusion tune "Total Recovery," he layers narrow, fleeting lines (played through an envelope filter) effectively over
Parker's looped guitar, and on the dissonant dirge of "A Re-Occuring Dream" makes it sound like a rusty gate hinge. Free-form electro-jazz for the indie rock crowd it may be, but few young jazz players are daring to go this far on record. All the more telling, an indie label had the courage to release it.