Kaboom

Even in an age when mediocrity is worshipped and celebrity is an end in itself, cultural cringe is still alive and thriving. When Pat Metheny or John Scofield come to Australia, they sell out concerts at hefty ticket prices and are rightly lauded as among the finest jazz guitarists alive. Meanwhile, a more remarkable one is operating right in our midst, performing to people paying the price of a couple of drinks at the Excelsior Hotel or the Sound Lounge.

More remarkable? James Muller? In terms of melodic ingenuity, yes. His sound and the lines he weaves place him with saxophonists Mark Simmonds and Bernie McGann as among those Australians with a unique voice and approach to jazz improvisation.

Kaboom adds another chapter to the Muller story. It began with a rather tentative arrival in Sydney from Adelaide a decade ago, although he was soon shaking up the scene with a sense of melody that was already his own. In 2004 he won the Freedman Music Council of Australia Jazz Fellowship, using the loot to hire a New York studio and the brilliance and experience of bassist Matt Penman and drummer Bill Stewart.

The result is startling and his best recording to date, capturing something of the all-engulfing waves of energy, beauty and passion that Muller routinely unleashes in little bars around town. That it does not exclusively contain those waves is not so much an indictment of the disc as an indication of just how astonishing Muller can be. I don’t mean astonishing in any technical sense (although that aspect of his playing is impressive), but there is a devil-may-care edge when he plays live that he finds hard to replicate in the studio. What it presents, though, is perhaps the most exciting jazz guitarist in the world inventing melodies to make you laugh in disbelief (D Blues) and cry at their loveliness (the exquisite Eindhoven); and lines that jolt you with their unexpected starts, stops and leaps. Stewart’s imaginative agility and sophisticated sense of detail have the drums twisting and turning with, and in parallel to, the guitar, flecking the lines with highlights and shadows, the latter deepened by Penman. He also keeps a tight hold of the harmonic string attached to Muller’s dazzling, diving, soaring kite. Outstanding.