Michael Buckley, Ebb and Flow, Livia **** Recommended

Recorded at tenor saxophonist Michael Buckley’s studio in Dublin, if you’re into Jerry Bergonzi and Michael Brecker this is for you.

Buckley – brother of Irish sax legend Richie – has a spectacular sound.

That’s obvious. It’s big, no nonsense, not weedy in the least, an approach that some players prefer often mistakenly to cultivate.

So you get that wrapped around human feeling – a great warmth in the sound.

But there’s so much sophistication in these often complex tunes that never get lost up themselves.

There’s a bond established especially if you like jazz albums led by saxophone players. It’s authorial, personality heavy, what is produced is meant to speak to you wherever you are. It’s people music, not just created for personal reasons or to please musos who can identify every chord change and work out if this or that is a contrafact or in the style of so-and-so.

Far from being a case of great and all but look, so what? Both bass and piano lines are fairly unobtrusive at first. Sonically the sax is incredibly well captured. If you know the work of gutsy bebop loving Galwegian Riley Stone Lonergan or Nottingham ace Julian Siegel – both no strangers to live Irish jazz club and festival audiences – they are handy points of reference if coming to Buckley for the first time. But I’m not trying to project.

What’s so real about the album is it doesn’t sound as if created by bad faith committee, AI or some sort of recourse to however well intentioned the group think of a focus group or wily ways of a preening A&R executive stroke real description clipboard toting accountant.

I haven’t heard Buckley live so only know of his mega reputation that precedes him which is totally validated here once again. Certainly hearing this is a compelling reason to try and find him playing live in some shebeen some time.

But then again what do players like him have to prove? It’s not about that, it’s somehow finding expression that can be transferred to strangers listening for the first time somewhere, anywhere. Yesterday is gone. But he’s played with the likes of the Mingus Big Band, Kurt Rosenwinkel and Edward Simon.

Pick of the tunes? Hard. I’d just let the whole album run and have it wash all over you. But Golden Rod is a truly lovely ballad and you can always gain an insight into the heart of a player when they can be vulnerable on a ballad and certainly Buckley can and is on this piece.

Felton’s accompaniment here contains some of his best playing. We liked him on the Origin Story album Good Friday released 5 years ago. But this is not about the piano player at all. Nevertheless his tune May Story comes in the middle of the record led off by the generous throb of solo Donohoe – Mary Coughlan’s bassist. He was on the singer’s Repeat Rewind released to acclaim last year.

Anyway let’s hope the album gets heard and properly reviewed elsewhere given the quality of the playing. There’s no guarantee that a fickle jazz phobic media more concerned with ephemeral tat and baloney will even allot a couple of column inches his or any jazzer’s way. But that’s more their problem than anyone else’s and shows how myopic and misguided culture coverage can be when it comes to music because the showbiz and general gossipy angle is what editors seem to latch on to more.

There’s an interesting – not gossipy at all – interview with Buckley on the Jazz Ireland site that you can also view above if you want to hear more from the man himself in his own words.

• Buckley plays Arthur’s in Dublin on release day (Thursday) and in April he’s with Organ Freeman at pianist Scott Flanigan’s weekly club in Belfast on the 4th.