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SUSPICIOUS
COLUMBIA
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This acoustic jazz trio for the most part replace the elastic, flowing time of jazz with precise, nervous metrics more akin to rock. There’s all the wit and bombast of past Bad Plus discs as well as technical derring-do and fiendishly complex arrangements, but only one cover, the theme from Chariots of Fire, with just a dollop of the cheese that selection might suggest. (The Bad Plus have been known to cover "Iron Man" and "We Are the Champions.") With pianist Ethan Iverson’s grand classical-style sequences, and barely a jazz chord to be heard (not counting "Let Our Garden Grow" or "O.G. Original Gentleman" on the new album), you might wonder at times whether you haven’t gone past Brad Mehldau’s dense romantic solo musings right into Emerson, Lake & Palmer prog. But those nervous fragmented beats slipping in and out of the unison passages, Iverson’s undeniably hip chromatic runs, bassist Reid Anderson’s full-toned jazz-like attack, drummer David King’s all-over-the-kit free-jazz hyperkinetics, and the general pop gleam in the tunes might also make you want to throw up your hands and clap yeah. Or at least, "I give." The Bad Plus + Color and Talea | Somerville Theatre, 55 Davis Square, Somerville | Oct 1 | 617.776.7777
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