Whereas most musicians – much less anyone else – slow down as they approach and surpass their 80th birthday, Wadada Leo Smith is only accelerating. He’s made multi-disc albums of grand ambitions from orchestral works to solo trumpet to one-on-ones, often taking on lofty themes. Never mind the frequency of his recent output; every project feels like a major, significant undertaking. Fire Illuminations (Kabell Records) is significant for another reason: he’s introducing a band.
Meet the Orange Wave Electric ensemble, which features three guitars and two bassists: Nels Cline, Brandon Ross and Lamar Smith along with Bill Laswell and Melvin Gibbs. Hardedge handles electronics and the rhythms are from drummer Pheeroan akLaff and percussionist Mauro Refosco.
Orange Wave Electric is a vehicle for Wadada Leo Smith’s rock-jazz side. Rocking out is hardly a new thing to Smith, nor are the members of this new ensemble; he united with guitarist Henry Kaiser in a project that paid homage to Miles Davis’ electric fusion era, Yo! Miles. His Organic ensemble, which also featured Cline, Ross and akLaff sported four guitar players. Ross and Gibbs are two-thirds of Harriet Tubman, an adventurous electric jazz trio that Smith has sat in on. Smith notably recorded improvisations with electric bassist Laswell as a duet and with the late drums legend Milford Graves.
But this is more than some recycling of old ideas, even if no one will mistake Fire Illuminations as being from anyone else. Smith liberally mixed and matched the personnel at his disposal to fit the material and applied post-production more generously than usual. And yet, the spirit of playing in the moment remains intact.
“Ntozake” (streaming above) mines a simple riff over a mid-tempo groove and the two guitarists (and trumpeter) make a commotion over it. That groove is suspended for several minutes by an floating interlude highlighted by Gibbs’ ruminations that can’t help but to call to mind a similar break taken in the middle of Miles Davis’ “Right Off” except this one is much longer, more organic and highlight Wadada Leo Smith’s muted trumpet at its loneliest.
The heavily percussive “Muhammad Ali’s Spiritual Horizon” is also airy, thanks to the imaginative way the basses are deployed toward the middle and upper end of the register. But even when the bassists cavort around near the bottom as they do on “Fire Illuminations In Side The Particles of Light,” there remains a large sonic aperture into which Smith can burrow himself and pierce the wind with his resonant horn.
A long, reflective intro precedes the main section of “Tony Williams,” another bonafide groover with a nasty fuzz bass as Smith soars above it like a majestic bird. AkLaff is taken off leash for “Muhammad Ali and George Foreman Rumble in Zaire Africa,” sparring with some Pete Cosey-like wah-wah jabbing. Just as strategy gave Ali the upper hand in his fight versus Foreman, so does Smith employ a seductive strategy for his trumpet volleys.
Despite a widely varied and celebrated career stretching back to the ’60s, we are still discovering the extent of Wadada Leo Smith’s ingenuity and artistic reach. Fire Illuminations, like most of his albums, is not just another record. It’s another chapter in his fascinating, ongoing story.
Pre-order/Order Fire Illuminations from Bandcamp.
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