Nick Bollinger reviews a jazz guitar album - with hints of folk tunes, spirituals and early rock'n'roll - from accomplished fretsman Julian Lage.
JUlian Lage Photo: supplied
The guitar might not be the ubiquitous instrument it once was. Where it used to be unimaginable that any band or singer-songwriter should ever appear without one, that’s no longer the case. I doubt Lorde even owns a guitar.
And yet there will always be others for whom the instrument remains an obsession. In fact, you can forget singers or songs. Here’s a record that’s all about guitar.
Modern Lore Photo: supplied
Julian Lage is an American guitarist, still in his late twenties, and he can really play that thing. He’s worked in a wide range of settings, most of which could be broadly classified as jazz. There have been collaborations with the great vibraphone improviser Gary Burton, with drummer Eric Harland and fellow fretsman Nels Cline – who, when he’s not playing with Wilco, tends to head straight for the avant-garde.
For the last decade or so Lage has been making records under his own name. The latest, Modern Lore, is free-ranging. In the opening track ‘The Ramble’ he seems to be simultaneously channelling rockabilly and jazz guitar pioneer Jim Hall, while slipping in a couple of bars of ‘Louie Louie’.
With the bass and drums of stellar New York session men Scott Colley and Kenny Wollesen supporting him like a warm and deeply sprung bed, Lage is free to roam around his fretboard, which he does in his clean, beautifully articulated style on a bunch of original tunes.
As with his previous releases, you could file this under jazz.
But jazz isn’t necessarily the starting or finishing point for these compositions. I hear old rock’n’roll, folk tunes and spirituals – all grist to this great guitarist’s mill.
The musician I’m reminded of most often is the great Bill Frisell, and there are moments when Lage comes on almost like his understudy. But there’s a voice of his own here too, and it’s clear that that’s just going to grow more distinctive with age.
Modern Lore is available on Mack Avenue
