Search - Chris Speed :: Iffy

Chris Speed
Iffy
Genres: Jazz, Special Interest, Pop

Track Listings (9) - Disc #1
1. A Little Odd
2. Graphic Ridiculous
3. FMU
4. Gina
5. PartIII
6. Skew
7. Skipping Really High
8. Coo Coo
9. Slippers

CD Details

All Artists: Chris Speed
Title: Iffy
Members Wishing: 0
Total Copies: 0
Label: Knitting Factory
Original Release Date: 4/25/2000
Release Date: 4/25/2000
Genres: Jazz, Special Interest, Pop
Styles: Avant Garde & Free Jazz, Modern Postbebop, Soul-Jazz & Boogaloo, Bebop
Number of Discs: 1
SwapaCD Credits: 1
UPC: 035828027526

Synopsis

Amazon.com

If there was ever a surprise outing by an unorthodox virtuoso, Chris Speed's Iffy is it. One of Human Feel's founding members, Speed has drawn together a lean, strong trio featuring Jamie Saft on organ and keyboards and Ben Perowsky on drums. The threesome prove adroit architects in the organ-sax-drums combo vein, working through soulful churners and then absolutely blazing burners. Saft's got incredible feet on the bass pedals and a pair of lightning-quick hands on the keys (check out "Graphic Ridiculous"). When Speed unpacks the tenor sax, he sounds brawnier than anywhere else in his discography (which extends from Human Feel recordings to Dave Douglas's In Our Lifetime and Soul on Soul). With tenor in hand, Speed charges through "FMU," only to spin into the balladic "Gina" on clarinet, Saft intensifying the drama with extended notes that smolder. Get ready, though, because Speed, like Knitting Factory Works labelmate Odean Pope on EBIOTO, has an unrelenting sense of charged improvisation that at once shapes and exceeds melody. --Andrew Bartlett

CD Reviews

A dynamic landmark album for the current state of jazz

cambell2000 | 06/18/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"What can i say, except this album is a wake up call to those who think there is nothing new worth hearing in jazz today... The group incorporates hard-swinging consonance, avant garde, and deep grooves, as well as influences from the middle east and the late 1800's romantic period. It will strike you as being a simultaneously jarring and beautiful work. Chris Speed is a master on the reeds, with an eclectic but streamlined clarinet sound and a big, centered, and slightly edgy tenor that matches perfectly with Saff's searing organ. As if using ten fingers wasn't enough, Saff walks incredible basslines underneath the extremely complex harmonies that pervade through the album. His solo on "FMU" stirs the soul with held-out dissonances and tensions that ultimately break down into a heavy swing when the rest of the band joins back in. Perowsky exhibits a deep-rooted and genuine feel for rhythm on the drumkit, making 7/8 flow like a hip-hop groove on the eastern-tinged "Gina". Perowsky also tackles 5/8 with ferocity on "Skew". "Slippers" starts off as a moving ballad with simple harmonies and slips into a nether-world of haunting intangibility before returning to solid ground. Overall, a very refreshing and intense album that you will enjoy over and over again."

Glowing rich heavy rotation

tactilius | New York | 07/23/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Iffy left me primed for more. This is vibey, haunting, essential stuff. The cd strikes me as being simultaneously dark and upbeat, sophisticated and raw and to the point. Iffy is a very useful disc- A rare listening experience and album of the year for me so far. Snap it up, listen and enjoy."