Sometimes it all comes down to sprawl; at others, it all comes down to the ordered chaos of crowded spaces. New York City has made a human and technological science of both: the seemingly endless numbers and diversity of its people operating in very defined, contained spaces. The fourth collaboration between vanguard jazz über drummer
Steve Reid and
Four Tet mastermind
Kieran Hebden is entitled
NYC for a reason. Over six tracks -- all named for geographical locations within the city -- and 42 minutes, this pair manages their most ambitious, rhythmically and texturally dense offering yet which maneuvers through a think, layered sonic soup that makes sense, even as it aurally reveals the poetry in motion of colors, dynamics, and how a lack of space can be expanded upon to reach into the world itself.