Hails from Knoxville
Drawn from Taber Gable‘s Push & Pull out on La Reserve next month ‘OMW’ is track of the week on marlbank – never mind the bloggers – this week.
Pianist, singer and composer Gable is from Knoxville, Tennessee where he began in music as a pre-teen playing piano in church. Later he studied at the University of Hartford’s Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz in Connecticut and holds a Master’s in Jazz Performance from Juilliard.
He surfaced with his debut in 2020, an album of originals called Hidden Driveways with personnel including Andrew Renfroe on guitar and Jonathan Pinson on drums.
Check the Taber Gable trio playing Mezzrow on Friday night
What does OMW mean?
The acronym “OMW” itself (”On My Way”?) shoot us if alphabet awry we take as conveying movement, progress, or imminent arrival. Regardless, we certainly feel Gable is an exciting prospect – it’s blindingly obvious given his study of touch – especially if you are aching for a new Robert Glasper. And who isn’t?
The track follows on from ‘Not Long Ago’
At that time of the earlier Pat Metheny Group-esque vocal ‘Not Long Ago’ issuing label La Reserve quoted Gable as he recalled his earlier life.
“I grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee, which put me in close proximity to a lot of different sounds. Southern gospel, country music, bluegrass, rock, funk, as well as a great jazz scene. Legends such as Donald Brown, Greg Tardy, Samarai Celestial (Sun Ra’s drummer), and many other greats lived in the area so I had a lot to pull from.”
“Sure, I enjoy writing and performing straight ahead material, but I hear and want to incorporate a lot of other things as well. Organ, guitars, synthesizers, vocals. And no matter what, I want to make sure I’m being honest in my approach and honoring all parts of my sound and what I’m hearing.”
Push & Pull is out on St. Valentine’s Day – Friday 14 February.
‘Cruz’n’ which has some very cool synth bass lines and fully altered cosmic Lyle Mays-esque stylised vocalisations that lift and separate is also streaming ahead of release.
The full list of album tracks is: ‘Intro / Ode to Fallen Heroes’; ‘Cruz’n’; ‘Push & Pull’; ‘Vessel’; ‘OMW’; ‘Not Long Ago’ [two versions]; ‘Somethin 4 Dilla’; ‘Black Yacht Rock.’
