Far, far away there be an island - me hearties reading this out in the longboats, take a breather. Islands in the stream? No not a Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton rendered Bee Gees penned classic at all. But these particular artists, the Oddgeir Berg Trio from Norway whose very different ''eyes that see in the dark'' are behind the best jazz Euro piano trio album of the year to date without a shadow of a doubt. Et voilà - erm vær så god - Eurojazz album of the week.
A Place Called Home's ratio of killer tracks to filler we reckon lands very high, oh 8 out of the 10 tracks - skip 'Happiness is Where YOU [their capitals] Are' which we found a bit more formulaic and the tad overly ponderous 'Where the Sun Never Sleeps'. But elsewhere and ridding all the more piddling lesser moments banished to relative insignificance it's the wisdom, sheer clarity of compositional vision - no you don't have to go to Specsavers to get all this - and deft interplay between Berg's lead piano lines and the very supportive extremely well recorded double bass (more of which later) and the stalwart drumming of Lars Berntsen.
Inspired by the remote island of Rolla, a very long way from Oslo, where pianist Oddgeir Berg's father was born, the album is ''about the magic of nature, the spaces hidden in memory, and the bonds that family provides.'' Yes such Moonpig like greeting card tweeness actually makes sense against the odds. And the album comes over ''just like that'' as another magic man comic genius Tommy Cooper had as his catchphrase.
Maybe the presence of bassist Audun Ramo, for 'tis he at last, who was very good on Aadal's Voyager makes a difference. A-ha, other Norwegians are prodigiously available, it does. Oh and go find what Aadal, like the OBT no strangers to playing UK jazz clubs despite zero name recognition to the as per usual badly informed wider world given rubbish mass media indifference, are capable of doing.
No fear of TB Sheets at all. Dip into classic Badgers and Other Beings from the Helge Lien trio why not for more Ozella label bliss
Certainly with the pianist-composer's mother diagnosed with cancer - paid tribute to on 'Song for my Mother' - and a lot of personal soul searching, introspective mood metamorphoses into a piece of art that has the ability to move. 'As We Wander Around' with its lapping melodicism and beautifully weighted drum accompaniment is a real achievement. 'Circles' is also lightning in a bottle. All Berg's previous albums registered nary a flicker on our radar. Shoot us. But tracks from this just attract us like a moth to a flame instead. And no, the cheque isn't it in the post. The trio don't sound like the far more complex Helge Lien Trio or godfathers of Eurojazz trios everywhere the much loved Swedes e. s. t who can do much more vaulting and elaborate proggy baroque things with the trio format if required than found anywhere here for that matter.
But if you love both amazing trios especially their more gentle side then you will be hitching a lift to A Place Called Home and seek solace as well as save shoe leather dropped off in the middle of their nowhere to discover a sound only they know chilling in beyond-parky northern climes inspirationally. And yet further proof presents itself with this forthcoming release just how savvy jazz indies with good taste win. As opposed to the spreadsheet Phils who often overdose A&R wise on gloss and dross at the expense of enlightenment at the majors. By contrast the North Rhine-Westphalia based Ozella issue a sublime statement reached through the sheer quality of the compositional minds and skill in the playing at work and nothing else intervenes.
Viral discovery factor
Berg is a bit of a romantic but not too much of a doomy one. Trust us we worship at the shrine of Shelley. And there are times here we think in his approach of another naturalistic minded monster player from Norway the polymath genius Ketil Bjørnstad whose ideas are often far more elaborately expressed nevertheless. Inspired by this album we paused to listen to Ketil's 1990s classic The Sea, which we share above to go even deeper having enjoyed A Place Called Home and feeling bereft about what to play appropriately next.
Obvs worth a few sobs
Yet there isn't on this far from dead Norwegian blue that same sense of, er, plumage, certainly scale and momentousness stylistically and of course thinking about The Sea again no guitar or cello made room for in the writing. Instead 'Triste' taps that love of soft jazz melancholia sincerely conveyed you hear beaming out of, mother of Mary help us, Anne-y random Caffè Nero nearly all the time, usually something like Ludovico Einaudi classic 'I Giorni' which has held us captive suffering Stockholm Syndrome over, oh my days - boom, boom - for years. 'Triste' mercifully swerves well away from being neo-minimalist as jazz neo-minimalism is pretty naff and should come like all garden gnomes with an 'elf and safety warning and optional protective gloves. But what the Berg trio do on this track is more a far cooler kind of kissing cousin reclaiming the idiom for once and for all. The voicings on 'Into the Mountains (Sula)' - final word - raise us up. What more can you demand on a damp, miserable Friday from what is certainly something of an emotional rescue life raft of a recording. Keen reader Deirdre, since you enquire, it's not drippy at all.
Out on 21 June
Tags: Reviews