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INFINITE RAINBOW
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Bill Frisell’s fans know enough to temper their expectations. So when he announced a tour with keyboard man Sam Yahel and drummer Brian Blade (both lately part of Joshua Redman’s band), they probably didn’t expect a traditional organ-guitar-rhythm set-up of the likes of, say, Kenny Burrell with Jimmy Smith, with greasy grooves and hot bebop licks. Playing before a near-full house at the Somerville Theatre last Sunday, Frisell’s trio offered a touch of bop and a touch of everything else as well, some of which can’t be easily named. Alternating between a plugged-in hollow-body guitar and a solid-body electric, and making frequent use of a sequencing-effects box, Frisell offered lush, atmospheric takes of pop-tinged melodies. The ensemble grooves were there, but understated. On the opening "Boubacar" (from his recent Nonesuch release, The Intercontinentals), he worked his way through repetitions of the melody, Yahel filling in the harmonies, Blade driving a light, percolating beat and accenting the downbeats with restrained but effective cymbal strikes. Monk’s "Misterioso" emerged from a free-tempo, sequencer-addled interlude, its ladder-step intervals a perfect foil for Frisell’s sparer style. Frisell’s "Strange Meeting" was an ideal ambient groove built on a repeated spooky four-note riff from Yahel with Blade playing mallets and light-pattering cymbal figures before the band settled into a kind of loose-limbed tango. Sonny Rollins’s "No Moe" (again, emerging from an abstract haze) was an opportunity for genuine bebop phrasing. What was most impressive was the variety of sounds Frisell squeezed from his guitars, and his dynamic range — light-plucked, almost unamplified acoustic bebop phrases, synth-like sustained notes, big, loud fuzzy rock power chords, sometimes all within the space of a chorus. John McLaughlin’s early jazz-rock number "Follow Your Heart" built to a furious climax. And the likes of Dylan’s "A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall," the Delfonics’ "La La Means I Love You," and Hank Williams’s "Lost Highway" all defied conventional jazz wisdom about contemporary pop — Frisell wrung maximum harmonic variety from their simple structures even as he extolled the singable perfection of their melodies.
BY JON GARELICK
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