'Trickster' is guitarist Miles Okazaki's first album in five years and his much anticipated debut on Pi Recordings, having been featured on six other releases in the label's catalogue in groups led by Steve Coleman, Jonathan Finlayson, and Dan Weiss, along with associations with other Pi artists such as Matt Mitchell, Jen Shyu, and Amir ElSaffar. Perhaps best-known as a member of Steve Coleman and Five Elements, with whom he has played for the last eight years, Okazaki has also built a solid reputation for himself as one of the most adventurous composers and guitarists on the current scene. The New York Times says of Okazaki, "Even by the standard of his hyper-literate post-bop peer group, Mr. Okazaki is an unusually calculating musical thinker," and as a guitarist, "exceedingly skilled with a head for rhythmic convolution." 'Trickster' was originally inspired by Lewis Hyde's book Trickster Makes This World. As Okazaki describes it, "The trickster figure is an ancient archetype in human folklore. They are creative in nature, using mischief and magic to disrupt the state of things, breaking taboos and conventions, opening doorways. They exist outside of the mainstream, working from the margins, creating movement across the borders. They cause damage and they heal. They are storytellers and improvisers." The music on 'Trickster' is designed to encourage risk-taking. There are many traps and deceptions, but navigating through these spaces open possibility of discovering new territory. Personnel: Miles Okazaki (guitar), Craig Taborn (piano), Anthony Tidd (bass), Sean Rickman (drums)
T**S
Delightful
Miles Okazaki is a guitarist who has also recorded with Steve Coleman and Jonathan Finlayson. Yet whilst it would be safe to assume that this previous form would allow certain expectations to be set, they would only be expectations regarding his ability to play his instrument. Where music on records by Coleman and Finlayson has maybe seemed almost intended for concert halls, Okazaki’s music on Trickster feels, to me, much more intimate, tailored for a smaller environment: a club or studio, say. In Coleman terms it is far more Rhythm In Mind than Lucidarium.Joining him on the record are Anthony Tidd on bass and Sean Rickman on drums, both also previous collaborators with Coleman, and Craig Taborn on piano. Together they spin intricate webs of sound, Tidd and Rickman developing a solid framework, Taborn and Okazaki weaving in, through and round it with melodies and harmonics which are never less than captivating and often, in the case of Taborn, intriguingly on the edge of discord without ever jarring. There is also a pleasing restlessness, the tempo never being allowed to settle, so we have the leisurely Eating Earth followed immediately by the frenetic Black Bolt. Following that, The West begins with Rickman cooking up a storm which the others join, Taborn in particular laying down some ominous cords at the low end of the keyboard.Okazaki, as a good leader, often takes a back seat, allowing the others to show what they’ve got, but when he plays it is pure lyricism, as on the slower The Calendar, which he develops over nine delightful minutes.Then again, it has to be said that the whole thing is delightful.
2**8
Great album
I discovered Miles Okazaki just recently and I recommend this album to anyone who likes guitar-based jazz music.
D**K
die Jazz Neuerscheinungen die mich 2018 bisher am meisten begeistert hat weil so eigen, fernab von allen Klischees.
Trikster von Miles Okazaki braucht ein paar "Hör Durchgänge" aber dann eröffnet sich einem der Zugang zu dieses einmaligem Album. könnte man schon von der Offenbarung sprechen.sehr gute Musiker perfektes Zusammenspiel und großartige sehr eigenständige Kompositionen. die Jazz Neuerscheinungen die mich 2018 bisher am meisten begeistert hat weil so eigen, fernab von allen Klischees.
L**N
un guitariste prometteur
Miles Okazaki nous livre ici un disque sans fioritures assez jazzrock avec mon pianiste préfèré,disque sans faute mais peut-être un peu terne,on attend le suivant qui sera peut-être plus entreprenant
E**D
Miles smiles a little
Steve Coleman's rhythm section +Craig Taborn is pleasant and subdued . Different from past cd's
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