Stephen Gauci - Wisps of an Unknown Face

CIMP 351

Despite a small cellar’s worth of recordings to its name, CIMP still garners its share of controversy when it comes to recorded sound. By now most of the opprobrium is boilerplate, but it’s never a good sign when a session comes with the engineer confessional: “To date this was one of the most frustrating sound checks we’ve had” as this one does. Bassist Ken Filiano and drummer Lou Grassi are both highly talented players, but as a pair they aren’t always the most complementary fit and the drummer’s boisterous explosions sometimes encroach upon the bassist’s filigree patterns. As the frontline, Gauci and trumpeter Nate Wooley fare better and it’s a pleasure to hear the leader’s conspicuously eccentric tenor in the company of another player who places premiums on vivid tonal color and variance of attack. Besides, the somewhat compromised aural cosmetics aren’t anything a decent set of ear goggles can’t cure.

As with past sessions, Gauci corners composerly honors, turning in seven pieces with characteristically enigmatic titles that are similarly disparate in terms of content. Two of his key strategies are a serpentine sense of time and placement and a sectional approach to development. Gauci tunes rarely remain static for very long. “Unless You Got Lost on Purpose, You Would Never Get This Far” features Filiano’s hummingbird arco, somewhat dampened by Grassi’s vigorous stick assaults, and Wooley’s rapid-fire brass work. Drums and bass work better on the slow building ballad “Did You Get the Secret?”, Grassi’s touch leavened by brushes and Filiano’s robust strums abetted by amplification before a climax that finds Gauci in full Aylerian wail. The drummer’s aggressive opening salvo on “My Death?” allows him room to move without worry, as does the punchy boppish rhythm that follows. The bluster drops out after another muscle-bound Gauci solo with Wooley doling out cool staccato streams, the clever trap door compliments of the leader’s pen. Filiano brings up the rear with a knuckle-sundering solo, scatting audibly on top.

Indicative again of the Gauci bait and switch, “Appointment with Disappointment” bounces from a tight freeboppish head into a molten tenor solo pocked by geysers of multiphonics. Here Filiano holds the center with a strapping ostinato and Grassi commences with a cascade of somersaulting beats. Wooley’s retort is equally energized and the piece closes with another bracing improvisation from Filiano flanked by Grassi’s small percussive accents. Gauci and Filiano slip into a loquacious conversation of arco swathes and fluttering tenor cries on the downcast “Loneliness Sounds like That” and the close communication between the two on the disc’s epic, if longwinded, closer is similarly superb. The set’s best moments surface through these kinds of pared down groupings where the potentially obfuscating effects of the ensemble at full muster are largely avoided. I’ve been a voluble Gauci advocate for awhile, ever since hearing his initial work for CIMP sister label Cadence Jazz. This set upholds my impressions, partly cloudy sound and all.

~ Derek Taylor