Marriage of Heaven and Earth (Innova 567)

The FCO are one of Boston’s most notorious avant-jazz trios with a few amazing and intense self-released cds under their belts. They are led by a young alto sax great Jim Hobbs and include the ever burnin’ bassist Timo Shanko, who can often be found smokin’ in Joe Morris’ main trio and drummer Django Carranza. On this new release they are joined by Braxton collaborator Taylor Ho Bynum on cornet, who has moved here in recent years and played with the Cecil Taylor Orchestra last year at the Knit.

This fabulous live (in Cambridge) thing blasts open with “Succubusology”, which erupts with that early Ornette Coleman Quartet-like energy, quick and frenetic and Taylor does play cornet like Don Cherry used to. Timo’s powerful acoustic bass pushes the energy to boiling point. On “The Kelpi”, the rhythm team play with quick spinning drive while the cornet and sax take their time to build their long, flowing and ever-inspired solos. Jim sounds as if he is playing tenor here and slowly stretches his notes into rubbery shapes.

“Ol’ Sow Rooted’em Up” bounces between a short super quick theme, while the rest of the tunes is an old time blues groove with fine note-bending old-school solos, heartfully played by these younguns. “Jaya” has the Jim and Taylor bending their notes together, twisting them spirits heaven-bound as the rhythm section quietly floats below. On “A Tree is Me”, the quartet play some ultra tight and quick changing, intricate and shifting dynamics. Django plays some wonderful middle-eastern groove mallets on “Aware of Vacuity” with fine laid back solos from Jim’s alto and Taylor’s muted cornet.

These cats obviously mean business and do sound as if they have been at it together for a long while. Gotta see’em next time they come to town, in the meantime dig on this sassy treat.
-Downtown Music Gallery, 2/14/03