Label: Greenleaf Music, 2019
Personnel - Rich Perry: tenor saxophone; Alex Goodman: guitar; Dan Tepfer: piano; Johannes Felscher: bass; Mareike Wiening: drums.
Metropolis Paradise marks the debut of New York-based German drummer/composer Mareike Wiening, who gathered a sympathetic quintet that features Rich Perry on tenor saxophone, Dan Tepfer on piano (a last-minute replacement for the regular Glenn Zaleski), Alex Goodman on guitar, and Johannes Felscher on double bass. The eight-track album of originals has the particularity of being the last session recorded at Brooklyn’s legendary Systems Two Recording Studio, a family-owned business since 1975, which closed doors on June 22nd.
The album's opener, “Free Time”, displays sax and guitar delineating the central melody on top of the harmonic velvetiness weaved by the rhythm section. Goodman starts his improvisation by picking up the final idea from Perry's early solo, but some of his expressions are also echoed by Tepfer, a permanent communicator.
Ambiguity characterizes the first minutes of “2 in 1”, where a bass pedal and bubbling drumming with rhythmic accents expand into a polyrhythmic cadence shaped with a bewitching Afro zest. It’s Goodman who claims the spotlight here, exhibiting a bright language inspired on the rock and jazz genres. Perry concludes the section for improvisation, having solely Wiening’s steady-state drums as a support in a first instance.
Influenced by Brad Mehldau and evoking springtime in New York, “For a Good Day” waltzes with sweetness as it is glowed by the bandleader’s scintillating brushwork. It’s a feel-good amalgamation of pop and jazz that benefits from a beautiful melody, tight harmonic background, and interesting statements from bass, piano, and saxophone.
The first three tunes described above might be inviting, but the highlights here are the shapeshifting “Misconception” and the elegant “Metropolis Paradise”, both carrying odd-metered signatures. The former is shaken by countercurrents, a peculiarly hammered rhythm, some controlled dissonance in the combinations of notes, Tepfer’s cool sense of groove and navigation, and Goodman’s narrative facility. The latter piece, a lovely and poetic exercise confessedly motivated by the compositional artistry of Argentine pianist/bandleader Guillermo Klein, features guitar and piano in a candid conversation, with Tepfer constantly trying to replicate and give a natural sequence to Goodman’s phrase conclusions. These two musicians work very closely throughout the album without ever trip on each other.
Also worthy of mention is “Relations”, an unpretentious, lilting post-bop piece that is the closest to tradition you will get, but still with an affinity for the here and now. Perry jumps to the forefront with empathetic bop-inflected lines, while Goodman suffuses his improvised discourse with rhythmic figures and phrase accentuations.
Not too brooding, not too exuberant, and not too bombastic, Metropolis Paradise finds an unblemished equilibrium in exerting good-natured vibes and emotion. Wiening is a name to keep an eye on.
Grade B+
Favorite Tracks:
03 - For A Good Day ► 04 - Misconception ► 07 - Metropolis Paradise