(1995) Takeo Moriyama/Mal Waldron - Bit ****1/2

 

With: Mal Waldron (piano), Takeo Moriyama (drums)
Record date: August 20, 1995

During the birthday celebration tour, Mal recorded two albums with the great Japanese drummer Takeo Moriyama. Perhaps not very well known in the West, Moriyama is really one of the best drummers around in Japan and recorded plenty of records there. Moriyama is a drummer that is able to play contemporary jazz but also the more free kind of stuff like and played on quite a few occasions with Yosuke Yamashita. That means he know’s how to accompany a piano player.

This really is one enjoyable record. The long ‘LAUD suite’ takes almost 50 minutes but isn’t boring for a second. The telepathical interplay between the two and huge variety in style, tempo and feeling makes this a fascinating journey where both musicians are able to give their best. A piano drums combination might sound unconventional but it doesn’t sound so. That is quite special as Mal really mostly builds lots of his energy on a bass player. But you don’t really miss a bass player here. The music goes everywhere from more free oriented playing to beautiful subdued melodies. There are some nice remarks of Waldron compositions here and there: something reminding of the Git-Go, a preview of ‘In the Land of Clusters’ (which appeared later on ‘One More Time’) and a clear version of ‘Snake Out’.

Mal has played with so many musicians in so many groups. And sometimes his own playing becomes just a very small part of the music itself and his solo space is limited. On this record there’s plenty of space for him to show off what he was still capable off. With only a drummer to duel with, Mal really gets in good shape here. He’s playing with both melodic ideas as rhythmic ideas, carefully building them out to something funky, catchy and swinging. The repetitiveness in his playing gives the music an almost hypnotizing effect. Yet not one phrase is exactly the same. And Moriyama understands it all so well. He is obviously doing a lot of things yet he still sounds very tender. He’s really more about rhythm than power.

This is one very exciting duet and it is very unfortunate it’s so hard to track down. Copies at Discogs go from around 50 euros. That is a lot money. But believe me if I tell you it’s money well spent. Then there’s also the great sound quality. These 3361* Black records really sound very, very good. Great mix with Moriyama in the foreground somewhat which gives the music some extra energy. Liners are in Japanese of course and mine smell of cigarettes. But the music is very good. Highly recommended.