One of the more encouraging signs of life in
the current music scene has been the slow, sure rise of Bill Frisell
into the ranks of alternative guitar heroes. His road to success has
been a long, weird one, starting more than a decade ago when he was
virtually the house guitarist for the German jazz label ECM. Then came
countless guest shots, work with John Zorn's audacious Naked City and a
steady string of inventive, genre-busting solo albums showcasing the
bittersweet poetry of Frisell's playing.
More than almost
anyone else in the last decade, Frisell brought a new voice to the
fraying realm of the electric guitar. Other guitarists, for the most
part, resort to chest thumping and smug, loud assertions. Frisell has
made an art form out of head scratching, with stuttering, slithering
sentence fragments for licks. He freely mixes the cerebral approach of
jazz and the raw good humor of rock & roll and various shades of
pop without trespassing into the dread world of fusion.
To be
sure, Frisell is a slippery devil, a crazy quilter who goes every which
way in pursuit of dry humor and a new musical attitude. Who else could
make such a natural connection between the screaming tones of Jimi
Hendrix and the circus-tinged exoticism of Nino Rota's Fellini film
scores? Last year's Have a Little Faith was a festival of cover
songs, with music by such sundry Americans as Aaron Copland, John
Hiatt, Madonna, Bob Dylan, Sonny Rollins and John Philip Sousa.
This Land
consists mostly of material from Frisell's old songbook, rearranged for
a kind of dream-world cabaret pit band ? clarinetist Don Byron,
saxophonist Billy Drewes, trombonist Curtis Fowlkes, bassist Kermit
Driscoll and drummer Joey Baron. A humble leader, Frisell refrains from
oversaturating the mix with guitar, leaning instead on the band's
alternately luscious and raucous textures.
True to its title, This Land
presents more Americana of Frisell's own devising, with songs like
"Jimmy Carter" and "Julius Hemphill" (the underrated alto
saxophonist-composer) serving as unofficial poles of influence. Some of
Frisell's "greatest hits" are present, too, from the knotty inside-out
blues charm of "Resistor" to the warm, dark passages of "Strange
Meeting," reshuffled and recast for the current band.
Like most of Frisell's albums, This Land
provides a highly eclectic and picturesque listening experience,
colored by a kind of goofball experimentalism. Strange meetings of the
mysterious and the earthy, the melancholy and the giddy, make perfect
sense by Frisell's deliciously warped way of thinking. The warpage is
catching on and not a moment too soon. (RS 691)
JOSEF WOODARD. RollingStone/Review.
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