Actual Trio – “Act II” – [Self Release]

mickeyslim   9/26/2018   CD, Jazz

Actual Trio is Bay Area jazz veterans John Schott (guitar/composer), Dan Seamans (bass), and John Haynes (drums). Recorded December 2016. The previous summer, apparently though, these compositions sounded happy and joyful. But after that year’s election (what the artists describe as “our looming national catastrophe”), they considered not making the recording at all.

What comes out of this is a technicolor palette of anxiety. I find that the music, while sometimes pretending to be cool and groovy, is in fact tense and jumpy. It has an improvisational feel most of the time, but is also clearly composed at other points.

Play it, spin it, slip it in…