Morning Recordings The Welcome Kinetic WB rating out of 100

The Welcome Kinetic is the musical equivalent of a tasting banquet at a seedy Indian restaurant: a mélange of subtle and not-so-subtle tastes, textures and moments, at times delectable (like the tender Tandoori chicken fresh from the oven) and at times stale (like the two-day old Beef Vindaloo)

In the same vein as modern artists such as Britain’s The Cinematic Orchestra and the widely-popular St Germain, Morning Recordings’ (driven by the exceptionally talented multi-instrumentalist Pramod Tummala) new album belongs to the intriguing future jazz genre. The Welcome Kinetic manages to remain forward-looking, fresh sounding and original, while paying its respects to the great jazz artists of the past, and this supposed conflict between old and new, tradition and innovation and cliché and nouveau is the dialogue central to the success of the album.

The title track is the most perfect example of this. The percussion initially sets a happy-go-lucky cymbal and high-hat beat reminiscent of 1st Quintet-era Philly Joe Jones, before introducing a rather rough yet flowing line with hard drums. The piano follows, playing around standard chords but in a playful manner that is bright and unpretentious. However in a break from tradition the key line isn’t played on saxophone, trumpet or even bass, but instead rendered on a beautifully chiming harp. And it is this level of instrumental disputation that makes the album such a solid offering, with the past and present combining to create true future jazz. One great strength of the album is something that it doesn’t do, and that is slide into derivation and musical apathy in its attempts at rekindling past styles and sounds.

The vocals, shared between Tamulla and the ethereal vocalist Edith Frost, are a haunting, melancholy affair. Tamulla’s lead vocal, heard on ‘Sugar Waltz’, ‘We Loved the City Years’, ‘You’ve been Letting go’ and ‘This is Motion’, effectively channel the late Elliott Smith in their raspy, emotional and lucid sound. Backing vocals, by Frost and guitarist Barry Phipps, are used sparingly and efficiently, and Frost’s lead line on ‘Songs from a Hotel Bar’ is a touching and expressive moment.

However The Welcome Kinetic does have a tendency towards playing on the safe side of the road. Certain themes, such as the trumpet theme on ‘Sugar Waltz’, seem unfinished and somewhat undeveloped, leaving the listener hanging to some extent. Similarly, the piano line on ‘Join the Curtains’ suffers the same fate, tantalizing yet unsubstantiated. Although described elsewhere as ‘mellow’ and ‘ambient’, these two words aren’t that easily applied. At its headiest the album is not so much busy (in the Charlie Parker or Bebop-era Miles Davis sense of the word) as it is strikingly full. And while it is certainly good to listen to, its ambience is broken, much for the better, by bold, fresh themes such as on ‘You’ve been Letting go’. This is key to the album’s success, as mentioned before, as it stops the album from sliding into the mellow, ambient mess it so easily could’ve been.