Fujiwara, Tomas & The Hook Up

The Air is Different

Label: 482 Music Country: USA

"The Air is Different is the second recording from Tomas Fujiwara & The Hook Up. The group includes the leader/composer on drums, Jonathan Finlayson on trumpet, Brian Settles on tenor saxophone, Mary Halvorson on guitar, and now Trevor Dunn on bass. While all of the performers are highly acclaimed and virtuosic soloists, this is an album that prizes the richly satisfying rewards of an ensemble sound over individual pyrotechnics. Shaped by the thoughtful constructions of Fujiwara's compositions and driven by his subtly expressive drumming, the music blurs the line between composition and improvisation, effortlessly celebrating a diverse stew of influences (from Wayne Shorter to Talib Kweli, from Fela Kuti to author Haruki Murakami) while demonstrating no uncertainty about its own powerfully distinct identity.

An actively working ensemble since 2008, their first recording, Actionspeak, was named one of the best debuts of 2010 by the New York City Jazz Record and received a four-star review in Downbeat. Jim Macnie of The Village Voice says, "The drummer has named his latest band appropriately. Ensembles can go anywhere if the intra-group chemistry is cooking...Fujiwara sounds like he's got his mates on speed dial." Reviewing a 2010 performance in The New York Times, Nate Chinen writes, "Insightful, invigorating...music with a history, smartly informed and firmly moored. Yet its basic feeling was contemporary. Mr. Fujiwara composes with a modern ear and an episodic approach: his tunes begin in one place and end someplace else, mutating in stages along the way." "-482 Music