The Bad Plus - Montreal, July 3rd

[Freetoojazz]

The Bad Plus
Gésù - Centre de créativité, July 3rd, 2006, 22h30

I don't want to make a comparison, but like the Melhdau trio, they are known for personnal version of popular music for the conventional trio: piano-bass-drum.

Are they serious?

In a Downbeat magazine, Frisell say yes and others says they are a fashion group who will disapear soon. For me, it is the best show i saw till the beginning of the year and even if they are humurous guy, they are serious musicians who made people happy to the first note till the end of the show after two encore!

On July, 3rd, i saw them in this marvellous room call the Gésu.They open will a new song call "Mint". Is it the exact title? Is what i heard. After, this one they made Lost of Love. They made two covers, one from Bacharach call "This Guy's in Love With You" and the other was an Ornette Coleman composition call "Song X".

If my memory is good, here a partial set list: Mint, Lost of Love, Anthem for The Earnest, Let Our Garden Grow, Knows de Difference, Rhinoceros is My Profession, Song X, etc.

In their last opus call Suspucious Activity, you will find a cartoon instead of liner notes.

Who said that cartoons are not serious?

[mke]

That's a similar set-list to the concert I saw and reviewed here. It was great.

"Are they serious?"

I have trouble understanding why they would be less serious than people who do cookie-cutter derivative stuff, but after spending an evening chatting and drinking with Ethan (the pianist) and Reid (the bassist), you'd be surprised how serious they are.

Suspicious Activity? is, I think, the best of their albums. Many of the originals are awesome ("Rhinoceros Is My Profession," "Anthem For The Earnest" and a few others) and the way they do "Chariots of Fire" (the only cover) is good, too. Maybe it's not serious, but their cover of Blondie's "Heart of Glass" (on These Are The Vistas) is fantastic.

[Felix]

Too much seriousness kills jazz. Some people work too hard to make it look respectable. Those guys, from what I've heard of them, try very hard to keep it alive, and kicking! Who else would cover Black Sabbath's Iron Man and make it work? The Thing, maybe. I didn't see the show as I was at the Spectrum that night for Romano/Sclavis/Texier. They ain't TOO serious, either. And that's good.