It’s been a mere two months since I reviewed David Binney’s Out of Airplanes. The alto saxophonist’s new album sounds different than its predecessor but it continues a line of strong works.
For Cities and Desires, Binney assembled an acoustic quintet, with keyboardist Craig Taborn carrying over from the previous album. Tenor saxophonist Mark Turner shares the frontline, and twenty-somethings Thomas Morgan (bass) and Dan Weiss (drums) fill out the rhythm section. Each track is named for a different city, but he doesn’t try to recreate the mood of each place through the music. The only possible exception comes in “New York City,” which is marked by clipped, twisting melody lines. Otherwise, what comes across instead could be described as the image of personal reflections Binney might have had while visiting these places; his deceased parents lived in Los Angeles and Miami, and the tracks bearing those names have pensive, balladlike qualities.
The saxophonist says his writing incorporates the feeling of rock and simplicity of pop, and that can be detected in the structures of many of these songs. Weiss often drives a piece with a straight 4/4 beat, and, melodically, Binney pulls emotion out of a simple chord change with the deftness of a brainy singer-songwriter like Rufus Wainwright. A simple formula perhaps, but there is nothing simplistic about the final result. - Mike Shanley
Tracks
01. Lisbon
02. London
03. Intro to Toronto
04. Toronto
05. Los Angeles
06. Intro to Carpinteria
07. Carpinteria
08. Intro to Rome
09. Rome
10. Montreal
11. Intro to Miami
12. Miami
13. New York City
DAVID BINNEY alto sax
MARK TURNER tenor sax
CRAIG TABORN piano
THOMAS MORGAN bass
DAN WEISS drums
Music composed by David Binney
Recorded at Systems Two Recording Studios, Brooklyn, N. Y.
Criss Cross Jazz Criss 1285 CD