Hank Roberts - Everything is Alive '2011

Tracks list

Hank Roberts: Everything Is Alive

It’s no slap at Bill Frisell to say you can miss one of his albums now
and then without any real harm, so entrenched is the guitarist’s rootsy,
texture-minded sound. But playing by someone else’s house rules, he can
reveal fresh qualities in his twang and shimmer. That’s the case on the
alluring new album by his longtime colleague, cellist Hank Roberts-no Americana
piker himself. Exhibit A: “JB,” a three-minute dose of liquid funk
that may occasion the first time you’ve had Frisell and James Brown in
the same thought.

Roberts has never had to worry about the familiarity factor. He has recorded
relatively few albums since emerging on the avant-garde jazz scene in the early
’80s, and has toured little since settling in upstate New York a few
years later. But he brings his own unique jazz/classical/roots-music sensibility
to Everything Is Alive . Leading a chamber-style quartet including bassist and
guitarist Jerome Harris and drummer Kenny Wollesen, Roberts nibbles at folk,
gospel and Native Americana while partaking of spatial and atonal strategies and
sound experiments.

“Crew Cut” gets the album off to an energetic start with its
rock-style guitar chords and blues shavings and Roberts’ frolicsome lines
on jazzaphone fiddle. Sotto voce chants and Wollesen’s chipper strokes
lend warmth to the front porch picking on “Easy’s Pocket.”
Tempo shifts, independent parts and wood block animate “Treats With a
Blind Dog.” Roberts’ drawn out lines and Frisell’s tight
figures provide the tension on “Necklace.” All the pieces fit
together with quiet strength and elusive charm.

Tracklist:
01. Hank Roberts - Crew Cut
02. Hank Roberts - Cayuga
03. Hank Roberts - Easys Pocket
04. Hank Roberts - Treats With a Blind Dog
05. Hank Roberts - Jokers Ace
06. Hank Roberts - Open Gate
07. Hank Roberts - Necklace
08. Hank Roberts - Jb
09. Hank Roberts - Sapphire
10. Hank Roberts - Sapphire Blue

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