Jazz CD Review: Geoff Vidal's She Likes That

With material from a press release:

Jazz CD Review: Geoff Vidal
She Likes That
Arts & Music Factory (October 4, 2011)


Brooklyn native Geoff Vidal is one of the young new wave of hot jazz players in New York City, busy several nights a week with various gigs. She Likes That is sophisticated and listenable, with enough variation to keep it interesting through all seven tracks. The music displays a casual disregard for stylistic definitions and categorization that makes it fresh.

Geoff is joined by Chicago drummer Makaya McCravan, (who also produces the CD,) guitaritst Joe Hundertmark (his steady gig is Cirque du Soleil's Zarkana at Radio city Music Hall) and bassist Michael O'Brien, with fellow trumpeter Tatum Greenblatt on three of the tracks. He describes it as a collaborative work, "The album is under my name, but it's a really a band project, and i couldn't be happier with how we played."

Impressions - the music is busy, each line separate yet interconnected. He plays the sax with virtuosic prowess, whether in abstract meditations or frenetic releases of energy, melodic or emotional. Splashy cymbals and crisp drumbeats punctuate the lower end, with shimmering guitarwork to add another layer. The threads of each knot themselves together and then unravel again. I love the warm tone of his sax and in fact a kind of golden tone to both the sax and guitar, along with the expressive nature of Geoff's playing.

The stand out track - I like Lanusa (#6) for its fluidity and moodiness - the sense of perpetual motion, like the waves comes in from the sea - the subtleties.

Track Listing:
1 Darjeeling
2 Different Planes
3 O-Zoning
4 Time Apart
5 Freediver
6 Lanusa
7 She Likes That

Darjeeling:
  Darjeeling - Geoff Vidal by BK Music PR

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