Fusion Point is a St. Petersburg-based trio led by pianist Kirill Sokirko with Dmitry Malygin (bass) and Roman Smirnov (drums). I have been playing great deal of jazz recently, most of it fairly challenging to listen to, but here is a very different style as the guys move through some of the most melodic and easy to listen to (as opposed to easy-listening) jazz I have come across for a while. Kirill has an incredibly delicate touch, and uses harmonic chords and feel with a completed understanding that “less is more”. The same is true of Dmitry and Roman as well, as there is a great deal of restraint on their part as they follow the lead provided.
I had a real hard time reviewing this album just because every time I started to write about it all I actually wanted to do was to sit back and just enjoy was I was hearing instead of setting down to the task in hand. Normally the term ‘fusion’ applies to jazz-rock, and I tend to think of John McLaughlin when it is mentioned, but here the term is applied to a mixing and melding of many styles of jazz including jazz-rock, smooth-jazz, funk, and trip hop, along with nu-jazz, lounge, cool, be-bop, and mainstream/swing. This is not jazz for a fug-filled room filled with conversation with the music striving to be heard but instead is jazz for now, to be listened to and enjoyed with nothing else going on.
It is an album that can be enjoyed from the very first note to the last, the first time it is played – no spending time trying to get an understanding of what the musicians were doing. Well worth discovering.
www.mals.ru
