John Surman offers a new album which is unequivocally Jazz in its orientation. For a comparably outgoing Surman jazz group performance in his discography, one has to go back to 1993's Stranger Than Fiction. In a past era the ensemble assembled here would have been called a "Supergroup": a quartet that includes three ECM bandleaders - Surman, John Abercrombie and Jack DeJohnette - and, completing the quartet, highly-regarded bassist Drew Gress, making his ECM label debut. Recorded at New York's Avatar Studios, Surman is in top form on both soprano and baritone saxes, and has enjoyed long associations with both DeJohnette and Abercrombie, who are tight and deeply anchored in this set. Indeed these two also have a long history together including the much loved Gateway trio. Seven new tunes here by Surman, plus Billy Strayhorn's wistful Chelsea Bridge and John Warren's Slanting Sky. Soulful ballads, hard driving uptempo tunes and fiery improvisations are all in play here.
