Jazz is best captured live, as is the case on this two-disc release of the high-energy late-Coltrane inspired Norwegian quartet, The Core. The venues are three clubs in Poland where the audiences seem to have been particularly receptive to this group's music.

The quartet plays a gumbo of jazz made up of some rock-sounding loops, fueled by the tight-knit rhythm sections' Rhodes, double bass and drums complicity (Erlend Slettevoll, Steinar Raknes and Espen Aalberg, respectively). Jorgen Mathisen, who is The Core's current saxophonist, propels the proceedings as well, with cascades of notes creating a solid wall-of-sound effect. This he does on one-third of the material. The other two-thirds features former sax man Kjetil Moster, who, although he has a more robust, percussive sound, is equally voluble in his improvisations over the rhythm trio's solid grooves. DJ Lenar also kicks in some vibes in about a third of the music.

The three parts of the recordings correspond to three nightclubs: Free Blues Club in Szczecin; Club Hades, in Lublin; and Blue note, in Poznan. The energy feel is high in all three settings, with vociferous, heated audience responses between tracks. And there is a lot of exciting music here. From the beat-them-with a club passion of "Caveman Blues," which opens with a long soprano solo, to the equally high-energy "New Thing," and "Zaire." "Illiman Dance" has an irresistible ostinato figure that pulls one in with its powerful undertow. The melodic motif of "Pharoah" sounds like a bossa nova thing over a hard free-jazz vamp and builds spiraling in intensity in a hypnotic manner. The title track, "The Core," can sum up the group's sound and serve as its calling card: very tenacious, fibrous music. Lots of meat and bones...intense, passionate, seamless, satisfying.

"The Sun Also Rises," "Blue Sky," "Free Bird," and "Interlude" are slightly more cool and "Bolero" takes up a hypnotic thing again, with an eastern sounding vocal track supplied by DJ Lenar. The extended techniques used by Kjetil Moster in "Bolero" are awesome. Some alternate versions are presented from different sets (i.e. "Zaire," "Blue Sky" and "Iliman Dance") without, however, their being carbon repetitions. This is passionate music performed by musicians with substantial chops and vivid imaginations.